Scraps of Blue
by Ivory Bangle
Summary: Parts of stories revolving around Arcee in various pairings that have been gathering dust in notebooks and on hard drives. The highest rated oneis M, but a couple of them will only fall into the K-plus range. Will update as I get them transferred from paper.
1. Surrogate

I've learned my lesson with 'Old Acquaintances' and 'Tips and Tricks.' I always start out strong with a chapter or sometimes two, then the inspiration dies and I lose my motivation. So, this is hereby declared my Island of Misfit Oneshots. All of these are up for adoption to anyone interested. I hope someone out there can do something with one or more of these, or I'd even be glad for some brainstorming feedback to maybe kickstart my creativity lobe again.

Please note that these are pretty rough. I'm mostly just transferring them from paper to the computer. I didn't refine them much into the 'final product' and only gave them a cursory once over with the spell checker.

* * *

Working Title: Surrogate

Rating: T

Pairing: Arcee/Ratchet

Summary: Ratchet offered Arcee the only comfort he could after Cliffjumper died, but he realizes he bit off more than he could chew.

Notes: This was going to be a prelude to 'What Little Femmes are Made Of,' exploiting the warm, tingly feeling I got when Ratchet rushed to save Arcee in 'Stronger, Faster.' If you go back and reread the last chapter, she mentions she had help forced on her to get over Cliffjumper. It could totally be a standalone fic though.

* * *

He liked the rain. It didn't rain often in Jasper, but when it did, the coolness in the air and the rumble of thunder under his peds soothed the old mech's stressed circuits and made it easy to concentrate on his work.

The others recharged like they were in stasis. Optimus had been the last to go, fighting the crash every step of the way. He really needed to catch up on recharging more than anyone. Ratchet needed it too and should have gone to his own berth hours ago, but there was so much work he could get done when he had the place to himself.

Arcee was coming back from patrol.

A few minutes later, her signal came back into range of Jasper for the alert to sound. He glanced up at the monitor out of habit, even though it couldn't tell him that she was cold and her hydraulics were sore from being tensed up on the oily, slick roads most of the night. Or, that she was upset. For an instant, the mech considered reminding her to stay cautious in the home stretch, but he shook the idea away as quick as it came. The femme knew how to drive in the rain.

And, he never used their bond like that.

It was easy enough to ignore each other when they spent most of the time apart. It was impossible to shake the general awareness of the other when they were in close enough proximity though. But, they were accustomed to mutually tuning each other out when they were both at the base. He managed to let Arcee ignore being undercharged or unwell without nagging her – at least not any more than all of the other bots when they waited until something broke or failed. Arcee didn't bat an optic when his thoughts disagreed with her ideas or felt she was being childish.

Then, there were times he couldn't ignore it, hard as he tried. Like tonight when Ratchet would feel Arcee thinking about Cliffjumper. Even more often, he felt her loneliness at night. She'd reach out for a ghost in a dream or search for her bonded out of habit when she powered up. It hurt the medic in more ways than one, but it wasn't his place to act on it. The bond Ratchet now shared with her was purely medical. If he'd not taken Cliffjumper's place after the mech's sudden and violent disconnection from Arcee, the void would've been filled in by fragments of his code and personality that Arcee had memorized in their time together, and enduring the surge of emotions and confusion all over again might have easily driven her to the breaking point.

It had been a miracle she'd recovered from Tailgate. That had been the worst case Ratchet had ever seen, and he'd seen more than his share of bonds torn apart in the war. Somehow she'd gone all those centuries alone with her offlined partner tormenting her processor. It was so bad when Cliffjumper had brought her to Earth she didn't consciously know which thoughts and actions were her own and which were phantom emotions she was picking up from the bond that her system couldn't comprehend had been severed. He knew how Arcee had endured. So had Cliffjumper. She was a fighter. And, they both knew the team couldn't afford to lose a fighter like her.

Arcee had submitted to everything he offered to try. She wanted Tailgate out and her life back to normal. But outwardly, the offlined mech's personality had rooted itself in her processor so completely that it surged to the surface to protect itself, making the femme fight and snap and swear at him and Cliffjumper. Ratchet was determined though. It stung at his spark to see the warrior femme break down into tears and beg him to keep trying in her moments of clarity. She needed him.

Tailgate wouldn't let her accept a surrogate then. Ratchet had tried everything else he could think of for her. He tried defragging her memory banks. He spent weeks of rechargeless nights trying to unravel its code like a virus.

Out of desperation, Cliffjumper had talked him into trying to bond with her the old fashioned way. There was a good chance Ratchet's much older spark would trick her system into rejecting what it thought was Tailgate. Maybe if his spark had been in it, it would've worked. He still felt ashamed and disgusted with himself, even though there hadn't been a real mech online that he would've been stealing her from. Arcee had been willing to try – more so than him. But, she'd lost her control over Tailgate, and her protective systems had nearly shocked Ratchet into stasis.

It had torn him up inside that he'd been so useless to help her. Of course, she'd said it was fine. He'd done more than anyone on Cybertron had attempted for her. But, it wasn't fine to him.

Her signal went out of range again instead of coming back to base. It wasn't unusual. There was something about the rain. While it relaxed everyone else, it made the femme restless and uneasy. Something had happened in the rain – something with Cliffjumper a while back. He couldn't determine if it had been good or bad, and Arcee wasn't about to volunteer the memory. He could've taken it from her through their bond, but again, that wasn't allowed.

It had been Cliffjumper who finally broke Tailgate's hold on her processor over months of hard work and often thankless effort, drawing Tailgate to the surface with his banter and goading until she lost control, then letting her fight it out until she was too exhausted for Tailgate to influence. She learned what part of her was the real Arcee again. The difference had been like night and day. They had their fighter back. But, almost as soon as her wounds had healed, Cliffjumper replaced Tailgate's bond with his own. They hadn't seen a Decepticon for years, so neither of them could have known what would happen. At least for a little while, she'd been happy.

When Cliffjumper's life signal had gone out, and Ratchet saw Arcee beginning to crack again, he hadn't thought twice about offering his bond as a surrogate to keep her memories of Cliffjumper from backfilling the raw and painful void. For a medic, this kind of bond was easy, clean, and about as intimate as changing a fuse. It was what any medic would have done, and it had been done before thousands – maybe millions – of times. But, Ratchet doubted very many medics that did it before him had had to live in close quarters with their patient and see them every day and feel them reach through their bond in their recharge when they dreamed about their lost companion.

The idea was to not respond to her, so it would fade from disuse naturally. That could take decades though. Ratchet had hoped he'd be able to relinquish it before it came to that. But, the fighting was back in full swing again. Bulkhead, and Bumblebee saw Arcee as their teammate and superior officer, and she didn't see them any differently than they saw each other. Ratchet told himself that that was alright however. He had nothing against Bulkhead or Bumblebee. Both were good soldiers and exceptional fighters. It was just that – even before he'd made the surrogate bond with her – Ratchet had seen that Arcee was a very special femme. Not special like some pampered breeder-bot on a colony planet. Special in the opposite way. Arcee had the potential to spark and mother great warriors if she bonded with the right kind of mech. It was something the Autobots couldn't afford to squander.

However, the only mech that made a good candidate had been long-blinded by his programing to finish fighting a war first. Optimus saw her as a valuable fighter and an irreplaceable second in command. Wooing a femme was the last thing on his processor. Ratchet couldn't exactly drop a suggestion like that either. It would be awkward for all parties involved.

There was Wheeljack too. Ratchet saw the way the wrecker looked at her. He didn't doubt Wheeljack would bond with Arcee, given the chance, and if it was as simple as siring sparks, Ratchet would've grudgingly played matchmaker. But Wheeljack was a reckless drifter with an unhealthy appetite for revenge. He was determined to get offlined as fast as possible or drop everything to follow Dreadwing. No. Wheeljack was the last mech she needed in her life cycle.

Ratchet folded up the microscope neatly and put it away, debating whether he should go to his berth or wait up in case Arcee got into trouble and called for help. He reasoned to himself that the femme could more than take of herself, but still … it wouldn't hurt to work on Bulkhead's spare actuator. It wouldn't take a mega-cycle to fix. Then he'd go power down whether Arcee was back or not. But, then again, his frame welder had been acting up too.

No. He shook his helm determinedly. This was it. He was not staying up all night worrying about her. He had to get used to ignoring the bond like he was supposed to.

The medic opened the access panels and began disassembling the part with his usual meticulous precision. It was almost relaxing when he had some peace and quiet and wasn't being rushed by a spark-threatening emergency.

Loneliness caressed his spark, and he looked up expecting to see Arcee's signal on the monitor. But, the map was empty. Strange. To his surprise, sadness followed that shook him to the frame, and he felt tears in the corners of his optics.

"Oh, Arcee …" he sighed, wiping the coolant off of his faceplate. She must have thought she was far enough away to not bother him, but the emotion was strong enough to make up for the distance.

It faded as quickly as it had come at least, and he made himself return to his work so he could ignore the nagging voice in his processor telling him that it was a bit counterproductive isolating herself whenever she felt lonely. He'd get Bumblebee to go check on her, he decided.

But, before he could step away from his workbench, another sensation swept over him through the bond that left him weak in the knees. Warm, hungry arousal flooded his senses.

Scrap. He didn't have to guess what she was doing. Ratchet thought he could just ignore it, but it turned out the femme was either worse at guarding her spark than he gave her credit for or better at taking care of her needs than he'd expected.

"Sweet mercy … " he seethed through clenched dente, his fingers digging into the edge of his workbench.

Ratchet's intimacy circuits surged dangerously close to embarrassing himself as Arcee's spark sang out to his in her overload. He felt his lower plating try to retract at her urgency, but Ratchet caught it and held everything closed. He struggled to ventilate the sudden heat away from his core, and he thought his spark was going to pulse out from behind his chest plates. Of course she was just getting warmed up, he realized with dread as his engine's rpms spiked to give him more power that he didn't want.

Please, he begged whatever powers would listen. Don't stop raining. If anyone else woke up and heard him out there having an interfacing conniption … he didn't want to think about it.

Primus. She could be on the other side of the galaxy right now, and he'd still be vividly aware of her spark rate, her hunger, the ache in her back of her winglets under her weight. His jaw quavered as he took in another ragged breath of the cool air before she could start again, and he could practically feel her heat against his chassis. His free hand clenched for plating that wasn't there, and his interface panel felt almost painfully hot under the other. Ratchet's face contorted with effort as his back arched and vents bristled open across his shoulders. He swore colorfully in his native tongue, involuntarily stomping a ped on the floor as he felt the inevitable sear through the bond again like hot lead.

"Oh … Primus …" he whimpered. "Don't stop …"

It would be so easy to let his plating retract and return the favor, he considered through the haze.

"Ratchet. Are you alright?" Optimus' voice hit him like someone had dropped a tanker of coolant on him, and he froze, hoping he'd wake up from this nightmare.

Slowly, he turned his helm, still trying to cool off. Optimus, Bulkhead, and Bumblebee were all looking down at him with genuine concern. His processor raced for an answer to the inevitable question.

"I'm … fine." More than fine, in fact.

"What are you doing on the floor?"

He should just tell his friends, his leader, his teammates the truth. There wasn't anything with symptoms to match what he was doing.

So, Ratchet looked Optimus dead in the optic and took a deep breath. "Albino processor nano-parasites," he said in his gravest voice.

The three took a few steps back, exchanging worried looks.

"Are they contagious?" Bulkhead asked uneasily.

Bumblebee whirred a question excitedly.

"Yes. Very contagious and extremely rare – I haven't seen them in any recent texts, in fact," he added for good measure.

No, no, no! He felt Arcee again. Her fingers running up his back, the warm exhaust from her coolant system against his audio receptor. He shuddered, struggling to get to his peds.

"What can we do to help you?" Optimus offered.

"Nothing," he insisted. "It's a simple fix, really. Nothing to worry about." A ghostly touch on the friction nodes on his hips made him jump with a grunt. "They'll follow me because I'm white! The antidote is simple, really." A soft, efficient spark beat fluttering against his thunderous pulse made his engines rev up again and his turbochargers began to whistle. "I'll administer it outside of the base," he said, taking a few steps back, "and if no other Cybertronians are around me for them to go to, they'll die off in a couple mega-cycles."

"Are you sure, Ratchet?"

"Positive!" he yelped when his plating tried to retract again. It would be a titanic feat of self-control if he would be able to transform. She had to stop, and there was only one way to tell her without the commlink.

~Arcee! Stop this instant!~ He voiced through the bond urgently and angrily.

Their link snapped off like an exploding light bulb, dazzling and instantaneous. His systems spun on at top speed a moment longer as they searched for the femme, confused, but he could think straight again. Ratchet steadied himself against the wall. He tried to feel relieved, tried to think he might possibly be able to go on with his evening, but that wasn't going to happen. Now, she was out there somewhere in the rain alone, and not even a direct order from Primus himself would bring her back.

"We will keep communications open if you need us," Optimus stated.

"Not necessary!" Ratchet insisted. "I … I would prefer some degree of privacy to take care of this. It's not pleasant."

His commanding officer's optics studied him, boring into his spark it felt like. Ratchet struggled to keep from looking away.

"Please, Optimus." He didn't dare tell his friend to trust him.

The leader vented a heavy sigh. "Very well. But, if you do not contact us by morning …"

"Understood. I will."

Ratchet picked out a few convincing tools and packed them into his subspace. His team watched him walk to the exit, and he struggled to transform into his alt mode even without Arcee's distractions. Once he was away from them and their worried expressions, it was disappointingly easy to focus on finding his bonded again. Ratchet promised himself to feel guilty about the lie later.

Outside in the rain, he swallowed any second thoughts … and reached out for her again apologetically. He felt Arcee shrink back from him.

~Arcee …~ he pressed. ~I know you're there. It's alright.~

He prodded at what small part of her he could feel. If Ratchet had been more practiced with sparkbonds, he might have known how to get past her block. Arcee was obviously much more adept at keeping him out.

~I'm sorry.~ Ratchet tried. ~I should've let it go, but … I couldn't ignore you.~

An embarrassed sensation nudged at him from the southwest, and he was suddenly aware of exactly where she was.

~I'm coming,~ he promised, quickly turning around and speeding into the dessert.

Amusement tickled at him before a cold, hollow sensation accompanied her voice in his processor. ~You don't have to talk, Ratchet.~

His spark lead him to a dry lake bed, and he transformed back to his bipedal mode. His headlights remained on, and he found the femme on an outcropping of rock. Her optics dilated in the bright light, and she raised her servo to shield them. So, he switched to just his parking lights.

"Odd choice of location for … reminiscing."

She smirked up at him. The water glossed over scratches and dents in her battle-worn plating, and she could have been any beautiful femme off of the streets of Cybertron. Any mech would have believed the illusion until she got up. Ratchet admired the incredible strength and confidence in the way she carried herself. No one could mistake her for a pretty civilian when they watched her walk, but it was still undeniably – and irresistibly – feminine. His intimacy circuits tried to flare up again, but he managed to quash it without Arcee's end of the bond urging him on.

"Not really," she said, waving a servo toward the horizon. "This is where me and Cliff used to come and spar … when Tailgate was still in charge," she added, tapping her helm. "We came here to race a few times after that. Any time we had the chance to relax, we'd come here. It wasn't often enough, but it was nice." Arcee smiled to herself, and Ratchet felt the warmth of her memories seep into him. "Then, one time, we drove all the way out here, and it just opened up. A downpour in the middle of the dessert on our one day together. What were the chances?"

Ratchet tested to see if the rock could hold both of their weight, and he sat beside her. She so rarely opened up to anyone. Arcee surprised him when she leaned into him and completely opened her end of the bond. He didn't need to feel the loneliness again to know she missed the feeling of companionship and comfort, so the mech didn't deny her. He'd fragged up all of their progress anyway; what did it matter? He wrapped an arm around her and felt his spark ache with relief at the contact and her openness.

Arcee chuckled to herself. "He tried to make the most of it, but it just ended up getting both of us dirty," she continued. "So, we settled for interfacing … in the rain. We were probably the first Cybertronians to ever sparkbond in a rainstorm."

Ratchet looked up into the darkness toward the clouds. "Possibly."

Arcee shifted against him, and he looked back down at her. "I think we should break it, Ratchet."

"So soon?" he asked doubtfully. "You still reach out for Cliffjumper in your recharge. I don't think it's safe."

"But, what about you? You never complain, but I know it can't be easy. Especially tonight." She grinned, and the memory of her activities made him shiver pleasantly.

"If you can give me some warning next time …"

"No. I promise I won't do it again. I didn't know."

"That's not how you should feel about it," he said remorsefully, shaking his helm. "I don't want you to shut yourself down. It's not what you need right now. Besides," he smirked slightly. "I wasn't exactly miserable – until Optimus and the others woke up."

His plating heated with her shared embarrassment. "Scrap. I am so sorry."

"Don't be," the medic chuckled. "I haven't checked my interfacing systems in so long, it's a little bit of a … relief … to know nothing's rusted over yet."

Warmth permeated his senses without any definite emotion attached, and he realized the femme against him was just savoring the closeness of the other end of her spark bond. Ratchet smiled sadly, squeezing her close for a moment.

"We should get back to base," he whispered.

Dread spiked through the warmth painfully, but Arcee made herself sit up again, drawing her end of the bond away. The medic was surprised at how cold it felt without her. How had it felt for her when she'd lost them?

"You go ahead," she said softly. "I … I think I'll stay out a little longer."

"Arcee …"

"I'll behave. I promise." She tried to smile.

"It's not that. You need to recharge," he excused lamely. "Come back and keep me company a while. It'll make it easier for …"

"It's not supposed to be easy, Ratchet." Arcee folded her winglets tightly against shoulders and hugged her knees like a sparkling. "I know your medical texts don't say that, but I've done this a couple times. If a bond break didn't feel like the Pit, no one would be afraid of any consequences and loving someone wouldn't mean anything."

He scoffed. "It's supposed to hurt when you lose an arm or a leg too – so you don't do it again, I suppose," he reasoned. "But, it's my job to relieve _that_ pain. Why not yours?"

The femme smiled slightly, not meeting his optic but looking back out over the landscape toward where the moon was trying to glow through the cloud cover. "Call it therapy then, or rehabilitation. It's something I have to get over myself."

He vented a heavy sigh. Ratchet didn't like feeling useless like he had the first time he'd not been able to help her. On top of feeling like an inferior medic, there was the issue of his bond mate being upset and lonely. It was all congealing into one big ugly processor ache.

"Fine," he surrendered abruptly. "I can't make you come back to base with me. _But_," he emphasized, "I can insist you at least get out of the rain. I won't stand idly by while you rust."

"Alright." Arcee nodded.

"I will escort you if I have to." he threatened. "I wouldn't want you 'getting lost' on the way to the Darbys."

"Not there. I'd rather have some time to … think. But, I know a place," she explained dismissively.

Ratchet caught himself before he growled in frustration. She was missing the point. But, he only transformed back to his vehicle mode and started his engine.

"Lead the way."

"Ratchet …"

"Epp, epp, epp …" he interrupted. "I want to be sure you're safe and dry, so I don't have to come back out in this weather later."

She studied him a moment until she was certain he was serious then jumped down from her perch and transformed into her two-wheeled mode before starting northward. He took a collective ventilation and followed after her, trying to convince himself he wasn't making things worse.

The motorcycle stopped outside an abandoned gas station fifteen minutes later. Around the back were several service bays with boarded-up doors and windows. One of which had said boards rearranged so that the door could be opened without losing it's disguise. He parked and watched her transform and open it to her height before disappearing into the dark interior. A moment later, blue and lavender optics looked out at him, and he transformed into a crouch beside the door, optic to optic with the femme.

"It's dry, and it's safe," she reported. "Satisfied?"

The medic forced the door the rest of the way up on it's rusted track and ducked in. What he saw in his headlights stunned him.

The garage had been repaired from the inside to stand up to the elements of the desert. Several signal blockers lined the rafters. There wasn't any dust like one would expect, and the windows had been blacked over to make it completely dark except for the ambient glow of an energon lantern – ideal for unfocused, developing optics. She'd fashioned an intricate geothermal system from the underground tanks to regulate the temperature – so a tender protoform wouldn't be at the mercy of the desert's wild temperature fluctuations. The old lift had been converted into a berth, and he recognized the heater coils that had been attached to keep it warm to a femme's liking. Tarps covered what he suspected to be scraps of metal. If he'd been willing to pry even further, he didn't doubt he'd find a sizable stockpile of energon.

"Arcee …" he whispered. "I'm sorry. I didn't intend to invade …"

Ratchet felt uneasy. The only mech that might have known about this place, much less been in it had been Cliffjumper.

"You aren't," she dismissed, taking a seat on her berth facing him. "I should've told you where I hid it a long time ago anyway – in case I was hurt or hiding or … something."

"I promise I won't tell anyone."

She smiled up at him, and arousal tickled under his plating through the bond. It was quickly swept away though and replaced with embarrassment.

"I should go," he announced quietly.

"It hasn't even been a mega-cycle," she pointed out. "Are you just going to park out in the rain all night?"

"Oh. You heard about that?" It was his turn to feel embarrassed.

"Optimus commed me right before you showed up." Arcee smiled, jumping down from her berth so she could step close to him. "You can stay here until morning. There's enough room."


	2. Warm Berths

Working Title: Warm Berths

Rating: K+

Pairing: It would've been 'Various'

Summary: Arcee always fought her social programing, but when Ratchet refuses to fix her berth she might finally have to resort to some bonding time with her warm-engined teammates the way Cybertronian nature intended.

Notes: I'd set out to write one chapter per mech in which she discovers how her company is helping them as much as it is herself. I hadn't intended to have any sex/interfacing in it – except for maybe Ratchet, who she saved for last out of spite, and who turned out to be right. But, it has the potential to mutate into a hot smutty mess.

* * *

_Jasper was a blur of traffic and pedestrians. The blue motorcycle navigated her way toward the school at what felt like a crawl. Out of nowhere, it began to rain._

_Annoyed, cold, and feeling the itchy tingle of oxidation, she finally made it to the high school._

"_Aren't you forgetting someone, Arcee?"_

_She looked around and was surprised to see that she'd brought June Darby instead of Jack._

"_Oh scrap." She felt her tanks churn when she realized the first bell had already rang. "I'm sorry."_

"_Well, don't just sit here. Take me to work!" June snapped._

_Arcee tried to back out, but got boxed in by two cars vying for a parking spot._

"_Arcee!"_

She sat up on her berth. For half an instant she didn't know where she was, but her optics adjusted to the darkness of her berthroom. The femme vented a sigh and lay back down.

"…_so, propane plus oxygen and … water plus carbon dioxide …"_

_She reached past her notes on the vid screen to write out the molecules with a fingertip._

"_Three carbon atoms, eight hydrogen, and two oxygen on the left side … one carbon, two hydrogen, and …"_

_She felt something hit her winglet and heard snickering behind her. Primus, she needed a vacation. But, when she turned to reprimand her pupils, she was dumbfounded to find she was on the bridge of the Nemesis with Starscream, Thundercracker, and Skywarp sitting at ridiculously undersized desks._

"_I'm sorry, Miss Arcee," Starscream leered. "Please start over for my companions' sake."_

"_Yeah," Skywarp chortled. "Kinda hard to focus when you forgot to put your plating on this morning."_

She shook herself back awake and rolled over again with a growl.

"_NO! Please! Please don't!" Tailgate begged, fully aware of the razor talon slashing into his chest._

"_Tailgate!" she screamed._

_His body spasmed a final time, and energon dripped onto the floor._

"_No!" She thrashed wildly until her back struts felt on fire._

"_You could've saved him, Arcee," Airachnid purred in her audio receptor. "All I wanted to know was … the capital of Nevada."_

Her optics unshuttered again, too tired to sit up this time. She felt queasy, achy, and cold. Nothing felt comfortable. But, the femme didn't remember powering down sick.

Primus, she just wanted to recharge.

_Klaxons were blaring and she had the immediate sensation of her tanks dropping down into her peds. She looked around at the Jackhammer's monitors and window and saw the flashing glyph for FAILURE._

"_Wheeljack!"_

_The mech beside her blinked dumbly. She pointed to the warning light._

"_Do something!"_

"_Oh!"_

_He bent over and felt around under the main instrument bank then smiled triumphantly when he came back up._

"_There. This just fell off," he announced, putting a worn out looking piece of black electrical tape over the flashing light. "Nothing to worry about."_

Arcee groaned and tried to shake her helm clear.

She stretched out on her front and looked at the chronometer then froze. Someone was standing in the door to her room watching her recharge. Her pump sped up and she felt her coolant almost freeze in the lines when she recognized Soundwave's slender silhouette as he moved around her room silently.

He still thought she was recharging. She had the drop on him at least. Maybe she could summon her blaster and shoot him before he could turn around.

But, when she whipped her arm up as the weapon unfolded, she fell out of her berth backwards onto the floor. Disoriented and frantic, she whipped around to fire at him as the motion sensors kicked on and the lights brightened.

Nothing.

"Frag," she swore.

She shivered, folding up her winglets tightly. Her joints ached like she'd been fighting Unicron all night, and her processor felt fuzzy.

Again? Stupid berth.

Turning around on her knees, she tapped at the heater coil, then banged on it. Nothing. Scrap.

Her chronometer informed her it was five in the morning. There was no sense trying to fight more nightmares for shreds of recharge, so she just got up. Jack wouldn't need a ride to school for another two and a half hours, but it would give her time to get out and get her energon warmed up.

The light in the main part of the hangar was on as usual. Ratchet could function on half as much energon and a third of the recharge as any of the rest of them thanks to his medical officer modifications, but Optimus insisted someone always stay up with him.

Smokescreen looked up from a hologram of an 8x8x8 space chess cube arching a brow but offering a friendly smile.

"Morning. You're up early."

Ratchet looked up from the welder he was working on and frowned. Arcee glared at him before making her way toward the door.

"Didn't recharge worth slag."

The medic smirked but quickly turned his attention to the game. He moved his purple mini-con down a level diagonally, capturing one of Smokescreen's red guardians.

"Check," he announced with a smile.

Smokescreen blinked, surprised.

"I'll be back after I drop off Jack."

She'd 'check' his aft, Arcee thought sourly. They lived in a desert. She'd take the night shift and recharge on the hot, black parking lot at Walmart before she admitted defeat.

"Hey," Smokescreen called after her. "Magnus and Optimus'll be taking over here in a little while. I wouldn't mind a drive. If … you don't mind some company, that is."

She did mind.

"Come find me," she said, shifting to her alt mode and turning on Sadie. "You need to work on your tracking skills anyway."

"Oh." His face fell. He knew that meant no one was going to find the scout. "Okay, sure."

She sped away from the base, forcing her engine to warm up then opened a comm.

"Wheeljack? You up?"

There was a long pause. Then a growling grumble. "Am now," the mech finally answered blearily. "What's wrong?"

"I need a favor."

"Oh yeah? Favors don't come cheap halfway through my recharge cycle."

"I need help fixing something when Ratchet goes off duty here in an hour or so."

"No can do," he replied with the strain of a yawn. She could hear the smile in his voice too. "I've received direct orders – and threats – to not lay a servo on your berth."

She growled with frustration but realized she'd left the comm open. Wheeljack chuckled.

"I've still got … four hours. I'm sure Bulk could pick up Jack if you wanted to …"

She disconnected it.

Ugh … mechs. Every one of them.

But, even as she was thinking it, her wheels were taking her to the most insufferable, annoying, arrogant … tender, protective … and warmest mech she'd ever shared a berth with.


	3. Mein Engel

Working Title: Mein Engel

Rating: T

Pairing: Arcee/Knockout

Summary: Arcee and Knockout begin a dangerous game of trading favors. He's just a Con, so why does she feel so bad for using and abusing him?

Notes: This got too angsty too fast for me. But, I'm immensely proud of the fight scenes in this. Just saying …

* * *

"Welcome to KO Drive In, where every patty's a knock out. Can I take your order?"

"Yeah, hi. Does your KO special come with ketchup?"

"Yes."

"Oh. I don't like ketchup."

"So, one special, no ketchup?"

"Does it come with lettuce?"

Jack was about to strangle the skinny microphone's neck. "Yes. Everything in the picture."

"Oh. I don't like lettuce either."

"Jack. I got this," his supervisor said, putting on the spare headset. "Go take out the trash and sweep the lot. Maybe we can get out of here early."

Fat chance of that, he thought miserably. She always found something to keep him here until 2am on nights he was scheduled to close. And why was Missy Deavers – the woman who could grow a mustache better than most seniors – too chicken shit to go take out the trash and strike fear in the hearts of all the school assholes like she did her subordinates?

He went to the back door. Did he want to sweep up the litter first, then have Vince dump the trash on the lot? Or should he mix it up a bit and empty the cans and let Vince follow him around littering?

Welcome to happy Jasper, Nevada.

Worse still, it was a beautiful summer night, but Arcee had gone with Bulkhead and Bumblebee AND Raf and Miko on an energon scouting mission – in Panama. Stupid work!

He grabbed up a wad of black trash bags and went out the back door. Maybe Vince would be out racing already. But, he knew that didn't start until midnight when the cops changed shifts.

"Hey Darby!" He cringed. "I didn't know you were working tonight!"

He felt something hit his back but ignored it and walked around to the back of the building, stewing as he shook the lettuce and tomato off. But, he heard Vince get out of his car to follow him.

"So, is your bike in the garage?" Vince asked as he opened the first trashcan. "I meant to apologize earlier for backing into your baby. I seriously didn't see it there."

"No big," he shrugged. "It buffed out."

There was no point getting into it with Vince when every kid with a spoiler duct taped to their Cavalier was here pretending they were street racers and were being entertained by their hero's antics. Jack checked his watch. Still 45 minutes left until Vince left to run with the big boys. He'd rather be buried alive with Megatron.

"Hey, I've seen this car before," Vince said, distracted.

Jack was surprised by the nearly-civil conversation, and looked up from his trash. He felt his hair prickle under his shirt collar when he noticed what car Vince was looking at. A red Aston Martin that had no place in Jasper, Nevada's auto circus was parked under the neon light, freshly cleaned, waxed, and buffed to a glow – and empty as far as Vince knew. But, Jack could feel it looking at him smugly.

"This is that dick's car that cut me off last week. He ran Johnny off the road. No one's beat him," Vince said, more to himself than to Jack as he walked around the back of the car. "Thinks he's hot shit, I bet."

Jack watched in horror as Vince reached into his jean pocket for his car keys.

"Hope he's got good insurance," he grinned, selecting one off of the ring with the sharpest tip.

"No!" Jack shouted, tackling Vince to the pavement before he could come up with a better plan.

"What the fuck, Darby?!" Vince shouted, shoving him off.

"Leave it alone," he warned. "Just trust me. I know the guy."

"Friend of yours?" Vince snarled. "Even better."

Shit.

"Wait!" Jack defended, getting to his feet and stepping back before Vince could get up. "He … he's a doctor. My mom knows him. He'll ruin your life … with a lawsuit"

"So you'd better not snitch!"

"Vince, stop!"

He grabbed the bully's hands and grappled with him between the cars. Jack was aware of car doors opening behind him. Vince shook his hand free and threw a punch, but Jack dodged.

"Knock it off, asshole!" he shouted. "The manager put in cameras is all I'm saying – since motorcycles started getting backed into."

It made Vince pause and look around.

"You're bull shitting."

"Try me," Jack dared.

The gathering crowd had stopped a distance away at this new revelation. Vince glared at him again, but let him go.

"Fuck you, Darby. This isn't over."

He watched them all return to their cars, and Vince walked around the corner of the building. Jack sighed.

"Great. Just what this night needed," he muttered. "I get to clean out the grease trap AND get the shit kicked out of me for a Decepticon."

"I hope you're not waiting for a thank you," Knockout sneered.

Jack scowled, opening up a trash bag. "Wouldn't dream of it."

"Jack!" He cringed at Missy's voice and looked at his manager in the backdoor. "Some kid said you're back here trying to key cars?!"

"What?! No! He's lying!"

"Him and his friends said they all saw you doing it!"

"Missy …"

"You're fired. Get off the property., and don't come back."

For a second, he thought he was going to explode. But, he took a collective breath, and went to get his bike from behind the dumpster. This was the best thing that had happened to him all night, he realized.

He'd chained up his bike, but someone had taken off the wheels, and just the frame hung from the post. Jack rolled his eyes. No matter. Simple fix. He took out his cell phone and called Ratchet.

"Jack, I thought you were working," Ratchet reminded him.

"Yeah. I got off early," he said dismissively. "Someone stole my bike though. Could I get a bridge back to base?"

"Jack, this isn't your personal taxi service," Ratchet scolded. "I'm defragging it anyway."

"But, Knockout's here," he hissed, looking around the side of the dumpster to confirm the 'con was still there.

Ratchet muttered something unintelligible. "Well, just wait there for an hour, and I'll send one."

Of course.

"That's not an option," Jack growled. "I'll think of something." Thanks for nothing.

"Jack …" But he hung up on him.

* * *

Arcee didn't know why they were here again. Her and Cliff had already checked out this exact location less than a year ago. And, the signal was just as sketchy now as it was then, she thought irritably, smacking the side of her meter.

"Does that ever work?" Bulkhead smirked.

"No, but it makes me feel better."

And, the signal was gone again. She growled in frustration.

"Here. Let me try," he offered.

Bulkhead adjusted it.

"The only energon left here is under that big-afted canal and a million tons of concrete," she snapped.

"Well, I didn't put it there!" he defended.

She vented a sigh and turned away to inspect the wall of the quarry for the hundredth time. Tiny flecks of energon glittered in the moonlight on the floor of the quarry, where equipment had crushed it into dust over the decades.

"At least Bee and the kids are having a good time," he reasoned. "You wanna go ahead and catch up to them? I can finish up here," he offered. "Arcee?"

Had it really been so short a time ago? She looked back the way they'd come.

"_It's kind of beautiful, don't you think?" Cliff asked. "Like we're not on Earth anymore."_

"_Mmm," she grunted noncommittally, engrossed in her scanner's readout._

_The mech knelt to scoop up a handful of sand and watched it pour through his fingers. The heavier sand fell through, and the energon dust drifted on the air for a moment like a glowing fog. He looked up at her and smiled when he saw she was watching._

"_Quit screwing around," she chided mildly. "The sooner we get done, the sooner I can get back to my berth."_

"_In boring old Jasper?" he doubted. "Look at this place, Arcee. Let's see what there is around here. We don't have slag to do back at base anyway."_

"_Cliff …"_

"_I never have you to myself, besides," he said more softly. "What do you say? We can find a nice place to recharge for a couple days. Just us."_

_She rolled her optics. Only Cliffjumper could imagine that there was an 'us.' Sure, he was funny and sweet, but he was just a big sparkling. She felt like she was his sitter more often that she felt like his partner._

"_Maybe we could pretend we're not at war for a day?" he suggested. "Just a femme and a mech – alone."_

_She stiffened when he touched her back and spun to face him, stepping out of his reach. His face fell._

"_Supposedly, we've been partners for two years, but you still treat me like an outsider. Arcee, I want in. I want to know you."_

_She vented a soft sigh, shuttering her optics a moment before meeting his again. Cliffjumper smiled cautiously, his hopes rising. It made her feel bad for never knowing what to say._

"_Alright …" she surrendered, turning her scanner off. Cliff's smile faltered when she undid her pelvic armor plating and stepped close to him. "Just try not to take forever syncing up this time."_

_The mech slumped with defeat, sulking as Arcee kissed the corner of his mouth and ran her fingers behind the armor at his groin. He shuddered as she found his sensitive wiring, but he surprised her when he grabbed her wrists and gently moved them away. She arched a brow at him curiously._

"_That's not what I want," he explained, clamping her plating back into place._

"_Cliff, you just said …"_

_He caught her mouth with his with a soft kiss, catching her off guard. Arcee pulled away, looking at him confused. What in the Pit did he want? The mech brought a thick finger up to tap her forehead and grinned innocently. She blinked._

"_Am I getting in there yet?"_

"_If you're asking if you're driving me nuts, then yes."_

_His smile slid to a half smirk. "I love you, Arcee," he stated. "Can you honestly say you don't feel something for me too?"_

_Her spark tightened in it's chamber._

"_Cliff … You're my partner … and my friend," she said. But, it wasn't the answer he'd wanted to hear._

"Arcee? Arcee?"

Bulkhead nudged her, jarring her from her thoughts. She looked at him blankly.

"Welcome back," he joked. "Have a nice space odyssey?"

"Sorry." She shook her head at herself. "I'm just tired."

"Yeah," he said, switching off the scanner. "This wild goose chase has me worn down to the indicators too."

"Let's go find Bee."

She wanted to get away from this place, but even after she'd transformed and fallen in beside Bulkhead on the road, her thoughts haunted her no matter how many miles she put between her and the quarry.

"You sure you're okay?" the wrecker asked.

"Yeah. Fine."

And, he dropped it, simple as that. Arcee liked that about the green mech. A lifetime as a working-class construction bot had ingrained an 'if-you-say-so' attitude that kept things easy around him.

Everyone on her team was easy now. Ratchet was well beyond the age of caring about femmes. Optimus was a prime who just wanted her to be a soldier. And, Bee was young, happy, and energetic and naturally avoided Arcee's negatively charged energy field instead of seeing it as a personal challenge like Cliffjumper had from the beginning.

She'd told him the truth that night _because_ he was her friend and partner. Cliff would've known she was lying to him if she'd just told him what he'd wanted to hear. He didn't know what it was like losing someone close to your spark.

And now, he never would.

Primus, she wondered every day if it would've changed anything if she'd answered him differently. He might not have volunteered to go to New York without her, for one. And, he wouldn't have become 'easy' like all of the others.

Cliff had still been her partner and her friend. He was still funny and sweet. But, he never touched her again when they were alone.

When they'd first come to Earth, he'd been relentless, but when she'd finally given in and let him on her, he sulked that she interfaced like it was a job and she never kissed him. So, Arcee kissed him after that, and he still wasn't happy. He made it a chore and wondered why she treated it like one!

But, when it stopped … Arcee hadn't been relieved. She missed it.

"Arcee, do you copy?" Ratchet's voice interrupted her thoughts.

"I'm here."

"I need you to return to base. I'm afraid Jack might be in trouble."

"I thought he was at work tonight."

"He was," Ratchet specified. "He called for a ground bridge because Knockout was there for those races. I was defragging the system at the time, and he wouldn't wait!" The medic sounded angry but worried. "Now, he won't answer."

"Bulkhead's here with me. Should I bring him?"

"Not yet. I don't want to overdo it if we don't need to."

"Bridge me back," she said, slowing to a stop so he could pinpoint her location. "I'll catch up later, Bulk."

"Call if you need me," he warned before taking off again.

Arcee could handle it. If the 'con was out peacocking before the races, he wouldn't want to mess up his paint in a fight.

* * *

Jack knew he was being followed. He could hear footsteps on the concrete behind him.

Why couldn't Knockout have just kidnapped him? At least Megatron would've talked to him like he was a human being. Granted, a human being that was an inferior race to Cybertronians, but still …

He felt his phone vibrate again in his pocket but thumbed it off. If he came back with a black eye, he hoped the old grouch felt guilty and everyone else would regret abandoning him on a Saturday night.

Besides, it might feel alright finally getting a few hits in on Vince, even if he didn't win.

His personal code of conduct (and his mom) had usually insisted he only struck out in self-defense. But, regretfully, the Darby's weren't unfamiliar with violence. His mom had a 12-gauge restraining order behind her headboard to prove it, and she'd 'encouraged' Jack to be on the wrestling team every year since he started junior high. Because it never hurt knowing how to break a hold if someone bigger and stronger than you wouldn't let go.

This was the first year he hadn't signed up since his extracurricular activities were now exclusively focused on keeping evil robots from destroying human kind. He smirked to himself. That would make an awesome patch for a letterman jacket.

"Hey, Darby." Someone tapped him on the shoulder. "Heard you lost your job."

Jack turned around to face him.

"Yep. Looks like my summer's wide open," he shrugged. "Don't know how I'm gonna fill the time."

"I've got a few ideas," Vince suggested.

"Yeah?" Jack smirked. "What are your plans, Vince? I mean, besides douche-rocket conventions and Justin Bieber concerts …"

The first punch glanced Jack's face, but he didn't return one any better. Vince had probably been in a few more fist fights than him, Jack would admit. He deflected an uppercut that would've made him puke and Vince hit him in the ear, knocking him off balance.

It wasn't easy being stupid as Vince found out when he backed off to gloat and regroup. Jack had had the advantage of watching a few debilitating haymakers be thrown with mechanical precision, and he felt Vince's nose and his hand exchange fractures. Both boys reeled away from each other, swearing in pain and surprise, then Vince recovered and tackled Jack to the pavement.

Vince still had both hands, but now Jack was in his element. Vince squirmed out of being pinned, but Jack got him in a lock, squeezing around Vince's armpit and neck. The bully tried to roll out of it, resulting in Jack having to throw him to keep from dislocating his shoulder. Vince recovered in time to give him the black eye Jack needed to guilt trip Ratchet, but Jack wasn't willing to go back to trading punches yet. He threw his weight into Vince again, and the pavement knocked the air out of him.

Jack grappled him into a sleeper hold so he could make a break for it, but that's when the ball bat hit him in the ribs. He choked out a startled yelp. Of course Vince couldn't fight fair, he reminded himself, wishing now that he'd called Ratchet back.

Someone kicked him in the side and off of Vince, then the asshole with the bat broke his nose and a tooth. He rolled onto his stomach on the asphalt and managed to get his knees under him so he could curl up around most of his important tender bits.

"Who's laughing now, shithead?" Vince snarled, kicking him in the side.

Jack couldn't believe it had escalated to this. He just wanted to make his point and be left alone, but these lunatics weren't going to stop until he was in the hospital.

He heard an engine rev, and squalling tires made the beating stop.

"Shit!"

"Look out!"

Jack was aware of a half a dozen people scrambling around him then running away.

Tires and breaks screamed to a halt so close Jack could feel the heat off of the engine that was idling just a couple feet away. He dared to look, prepared to see Bumblebee, but it wasn't Bee's red bumper that was inches from his face when he looked up.

"What the fuck?" he heard Vince mutter.

Sort of what Jack was wondering. Was this it?

The most tense moment of his life felt like it stretched out for an hour. Suddenly, the engine roared to life, echoing off of the buildings around them, and the asshole 'con spun his tires, inching toward Jack menacingly. Jack tried to get up, but moving anything made everything else hurt. Jack got to his hands and knees at least and crawled toward the sidewalk with Knockout toying with him close behind.

All the other kids had hightailed it since they knew someone somewhere was calling the cops about the noise. As suddenly as it started, Knockout killed his engine and jerked as his back tires stopped, neatly parallel parked at the curb. Since Cybertronian tires didn't melt like Crayola crayons under the equivalent of a couple thousand Earth horsepower, Knockout hadn't left a mark, and the car looked like it had been sitting there all night when the police cruiser rolled past.

Jack didn't feel like filling out a police report or getting sent to his mom in an ambulance. There would have been way more screaming and flipping out than he could deal with tonight. So, he leaned back on the parking meter behind Knockout until they turned the corner.

He cleared the blood and spit out of his mouth from his cut cheek and lip and missing tooth, and he tried to stem the flow of his nose with his shirt.

"I hope you're not waiting for a thank you," he grumbled when the lights were out of sight.

"Wouldn't dream of it."

Jack used the meter to climb to his feet.

"Would it have killed you to jump in a little sooner?"

"Considering they might have killed you if I hadn't jumped in at all, you shouldn't be complaining," the Aston growled. "I was rather enjoying the show, but I heard you tell your friends I was here, I couldn't let myself be framed by a bunch of adolescent mouth-breathers."

Jack stepped back onto the street, scanning the black pavement, then he bent and picked up his tooth.

"So, are you gonna kidnap me while you've got the chance, or are you still going to the Circuit?"

"You'd only drag me down," the 'con excused. "Besides, you stink like onions and animal fat. I wouldn't even tie you to my roof."

Before Jack had time to be surprised, the sound of a familiar engine made him look back down the road. Arcee swung around the corner at a reckless speed and gunned it toward them – or more specifically, toward Knockout. The mech quickly transformed, pulling his staff out of sub-space.

"Arcee, wait!" Jack yelled, but he wasn't dumb enough to try stepping between them.

The motorcycle launched itself and hit Knockout in the chest, throwing both of them back through some parking meters and a mailbox. The Decepticon kicked her off and over, and Arcee transformed to land on her feet at a run, blaster charged and ready. She dodged a shot from his cannon, but he caught her on the recovery with the prod end of his staff, sending her back and through the window of the old, empty hardware store.

"Arcee!"

Jack didn't hear an alarm, but there might've been a silent one. He jogged across the street, but his guardian burst back out, blasters blazing. Knockout strafed to the right as he came at her again. This time, he caught her with the door on his arm like a hatchet, slamming her between the neck and shoulder. She crumpled to the pavement but kicked his legs out from under him before he could get his prod around.

He grabbed her wrists to keep her from shooting him in the face. Arcee twisted her legs free and shoved him off, but the mech pulled her with him. She grappled for control of her arms and ended up straddling Knockout's waist.

"I like a femme that takes charge," he couldn't resist leering before revving his engine hard and loud beneath her.

Arcee stiffened visibly for half a moment, giving the 'con the opening he needed to sit up and slam his helm into hers. The femme was quicker to recover than he expected, and it surprised him when she forced their hands behind him and broke his grip on her blasters.

She jumped to her feet with Knockout in her sights.

"He didn't do anything!" Jack finally yelled, seeing his chance to intervene without getting smashed. "Vince and his buddies did," he explained when he knew he had Arcee's attention. "Knockout was just running them off after Vince tried to key his door."

She scoffed, not taking her optics off of the red mech. "Yeah. So he could throw you in his trunk," she reasoned.

"He would've caught me at work if he was going to. It's racing night."

"That's a pretty weak defense, Jack," she pointed out truthfully. "Knockout wouldn't help you, even if it was convenient for him."

"Don't you think that's a little pessimistic?" Knockout asked dryly, hands still up in submission.

"You're a Decepticon, aren't you?" she accused.

"And, that means I have no capacity for compassion?"

She smirked. "Your track record speaks for itself," she dismissed, getting anxious with the exchange.

"Oh please," he chuckled. "And, you're the perfect angel just because you're an Autobot? One that's never felt a tickle of bloodlust or wanted revenge …"

"Shut up," she warned.

"Arcee, please …" Jack coaxed. "Just this once. He saved me."

"Jack, are you forgetting?! It's Knockout. How many times would he have killed you by now if he could have?"

Jack slumped. He knew she was right, but it still felt wrong. "Come on, Arcee. I hear sirens," he pointed out. "We don't have the time, and you couldn't drag his dead chassis through a ground bridge on your own."

She met the mech's ruby optics, and he shrugged, grinning.

"I know what I'd do," he offered. "But, I'm just a Decepticon."

And, he'd be back to trying to kill them within the hour, but Jack was right.

"Frag …" she swore under her breath. "Get out of here before I change my mind."

Knockout got to his feet, still in her sights but wasn't in a hurry to follow orders, even though the police were just a few blocks away now. He bowed at the hip curtly to her blasters.

"Herzlichen dank, mein engel."

"That better not mean something shitty when I look it up," she warned hollowly.

The red mech only chuckled, turning his back to her, and they watched him transform and race away, tearing around the corner and out of sight.

"Not one word about this to anyone," she said sternly.

"About what?" Jack smiled.

Arcee shook her head, unable to keep from smiling too.

"Let's get you to the hospital, Rocky."

* * *

She lay on her berth, staring at the florescent lights on the dark ceiling of her room. She couldn't power down, and even worse, she couldn't decide why.

Seeing Jack hurt so badly had upset her. She was supposed to be his guardian, and she hadn't been there for him. He needed her and counted on her. What if something worse had happened? What if Knockout HAD kidnapped him and taking him back to the Nemesis? What if he hadn't intervened and Jack's assailants had gone too far?

She vented a sigh and tried to push the thoughts away.

Knockout, that slag sucker.

But, she still didn't know if she was more upset with herself for not being there or angry at the Decepticon for being there and doing her job. Then his mocking accusations hadn't helped. She never claimed to be faultless, but she could've been better. She coudl've been a better soldier, a better guardian, a better partner … a better friend.

Arcee found herself missing Cliffjumper again. He would've made a wise crack about the Con then try to tell her she wasn't as bad as she thought. He'd be wrong, but Cliff wouldn't care.

She shuttered her optics and tried to shake his memory away Cliff would've wanted her, and Arcee was surprised to feel a tickle of arousal at the back of her processor. She would've let him; she would've wanted him to. Cliffjumper used to caress her winglets and kiss her neck and shoulders, but that didn't excite her even now. So, why was she so hungry for him if that wasn't what she wanted?

She'd want to sync with the mech so fast it would leave him him weak in the knees and his engines hot from the effort. She shivered as static seemed to course through her core. Yes. She'd want to feel his engine against her panel and his claws digging into her to pull her closer to the vibration.

Claws? Her optics opened and she sat up. Guilt and shame made the air in her room feel thick and claustrophobic.

In the common area, it wasn't any better. Ratchet looked up from his microscope when she came out of the hall.

"Shouldn't you be recharging?" he accused more than suggested.

"What? Are you the only one allowed to burn a little midnight oil?"

"I'm old, and I don't usually have to worry about being ready to fight at any given moment."

Arcee had already walked to the entry ramp despite the medic's lecture. When she looked back at him, he hadn't moved from his work bench.

"I had a nightmare," she said truthfully. "I think I'm going to go for a drive and maybe stay at the Darby's"

The white mech waved her off dismissively. He knew she wouldn't listen to him once she made up her processor about something. He didn't care to know the details. Ratchet was easy.

The air had a chill in it even though it was summer, but the black asphalt had soaked up the blazing heat of the day and felt warm on her tires.

Jack was probably asleep by now, but at least she'd be there when he woke up. Impossibly, he'd looked even worse when she'd left him at the hospital entrance. Humans healed so strangely. June was understandably upset, even more so when she learned he might have been kidnapped by a Decepticon if Vince hadn't followed him.

Arcee had told Ratchet she'd found Knockout before he found Jack, but their fight had given Vince time to get Jack instead. Was she any better for lying, or was she just proving Knockout right again? Was she lying because she didn't want the team to know she'd let him go, or was it because she was ashamed the enemy had been there for jack because she hadn't been?

Arcee sped up, trying to outrun the thoughts or blow them away in the turbulence.

Jack would be fine, and no one would find out what happened. Even Knockout wasn't going to tell anyone he got away because she let him or that he helped a human. But, he would very likely boast that he'd gotten a rise out of her when she'd been on top of him.

"Scrap," she said out loud to the wind, and she sped up again.

No one would believe him, she told herself. Besides, if the right mech heard, he might question why his medic hadn't offlined her while she had her so close. Knockout was at least that smart, unlike certain soliloquy-prone seekers. Hopefully he was, at least.

She saw the lights of Jasper ahead and realized she was doing over 175. Way to stay low profile. But, none of the Jasper police cruisers were around according to their tracking devices.

They blue motorcycle made a pass through town. All was quiet and dark, even the circuit where Vince and his gang raced was silent. Not that she was disappointed, but she would've liked to see how much damage Jack had done for her own satisfaction. If it wouldn't have been proving Knockout right, she might've been up to setting 'The Bullet' on fire and pushing it over the train tracks. That corroded little lock nut was probably feeling pretty high and mighty right now.

Arcee drove away from the circuit before she talked herself into it and made a pass down Main Street. KO was closed, and the section of sidewalk her fight had busted up was taped off. The window was boarded over. It was going to keep Jasper PD busy for a while trying to figure out what kind of crash had happened here. If the city ever got the budgeting for traffic cameras, the kids might have to relocate.

The Darby's house was dark. June wouldn't be home for three more hours, so she had the garage to herself.

Arcee tried to open the door quietly, but no sooner than she'd let it back down behind her, the door to the house opened to reveal a sleepy-eyed Jack in his boxers and untied sneakers, wielding a street hockey stick.

"If I was a burglar, I'd be terrified," Arcee smiled from the dark.

Jack sighed with relief, turning the lights on.

"I was afraid it was Vince or his buddies," he said. "What are you doing out?" I thought you hated being cooped up in here."

"Couldn't sleep," she admitted with a shrug. "I figured I'd come check on you."

Jack gingerly touched his swollen, purple eye.

"It looks worse than it feels," he tried to assure.

But, with his shirt off, Arcee could see more bruises on his ribs and sides. His hand was in a cast, his left ear had been padded and bandaged, and the gash on the bridge of his nose had been butterflied shut.

"Don't feel too sorry for me. I intend to milk it for all it's worth with the ladies," he joked.

"Where I come from, battle scars are only sexy if the mech won," she pointed out, amused.

Jack waived it off. "If he wins the war, you mean," he smirked. "Vince may have won the battle but the summer is young."

Arcee rolled her optics. "I liked you better when you weren't pumped up on … testosterone," she said after Googling the human male equivalent. "How about you try NOT giving me a spark attack before school starts?" she chuckled. "Messing up once was bad enough."

Jack's smile sobered. "Arcee, you didn't mess up," he consoled. "I was the one that didn't wait on Ratchet."

"But, I should've been with you anyway."

"You can't be with me 24/7. Don't beat yourself up for doing your job. I'm fine."

"Only because Knockout was there."

Jack frowned thoughtfully. "That's what this is really about, isn't it? Letting him go?" he asked. "Or was it what he said about you doing bad things? Arcee, he was just trying to get in your head."

She hung her helm ashamed of feeling ashamed, as crazy as that sounded.

"Nobody's perfect, but nothing's ever as easy as black and white either. You're crazy if you think you've ever acted like anything but an Autobot," he added, laying a comforting hand on her bracer. "But, crazy or not, you're still my friend and my hero."

She wrapped a servo around him and hugged him gently. "I think you've got some kind of concussion," she smirked. "That's the sappiest thing I've ever heard you say."


	4. Dreambridge

To **CreativeMultitasker** and **Iceinherheart**: Hopefully, this doesn't come across as creepy and desperate, but if you're reading this, thank you. A million times, thank you! Your reviews and support mean so much to me, but I never know how to respond. This fandom has been fairly ruthless when it comes to feedback, and I always wonder what I'm doing wrong or not doing right. Then one of you will post a review or favorite a story, and that reassures me it's not a wasted effort. If you think it's okay, odds are good there are others out there that like it too and just don't say so.

Most sincerely,  
IB

* * *

Working Title: Dreambridge

Rating: T

Pairing: Arcee/Ratchet

Summary: When a modification to the groundbridge goes wrong, Ratchet thinks Arcee is haunting his processor for killing her. But, the Arcee in his dreams and thoughts seems convincingly adamant that she's not offline.

Notes: I was going to put Arcee at the mercy of Ratchet's dreams and thoughts. Some funny, some nightmares, some delving into the medic's past more deeply than he'd care for.

* * *

"I dunno, Ratchet. Hooking something like that up to your brain … seems pretty risky," Miko said doubtfully.

Ratchet continued to arrange the fine wires in a neat fan by color, ignoring the assembly of humans watching him.

"It is a straight-forward process," he assured, though he really didn't know why he felt the need to explain himself or justify anything. "It's no more invasive than setting up a holoform drive, and there isn't a direct tie-in to my neural net. Perfectly safe, in other words."

"Is it bothering anyone else here that Miko is being the voice of reason, and Ratchet is doing something crazy?" Raf asked. Beside him, Jack and Fowler – then, even Miko raised their hands.

"It's NOT crazy," the medic insisted firmly. "I know what I'm doing."

He cast a scowl at everyone around his workbench then turned his back to Raf and pried up the back of his helm, revealing the mesh of delicate components.

"Now," he said with finality. "All I need you to do is connect the wires to my auxiliary conduit in the correct order."

Raf swallowed.

"Alright, but …"

"Just do it! This isn't open-case spark surgery." He winced feeling something sharp splice the casing a little too clumsily. "But, don't attack it either!"

If he'd had his druthers, Wheeljack or Optimus would've been the one to do this. But, he'd had to settle for Raf since everyone else was out on an energon run.

"What if he slips, and Team Prime's medic becomes a robo-vegetable?" Miko asked.

He felt Raf hesitate, and his energon tanks churned.

"Could you not distract him so much?" he requested. He wouldn't deny he was nervous enough as it was.

"I still don't understand why you need it," Fowler said.

"Yeah." Jack nodded. "The team's done just fine with you manning the groudbridge."

"The point is, I shouldn't _have_ to man it. Soundwave has a similar modification for operating the Decepticon groundbridges without being confined to it's console, and it's given them the advantage on several occasions." Ratchet explained. Again. "We've been fortunate that I've always been available to operate it. But, what if I'm not? What if I have to fight, or I'm in a life-or-death operation?"

"That's why you taught Raf," Miko pointed out. "Right?"

Ratchet vented a sigh. "If this prototype works, we'll all have the ability to summon a groundbridge to our exact coordinates with no middleman and in a fraction of the time it would take to comm me and for me to put in the coordinates and open the bridge from the base. And, anyone at base will be able to send a groundbridge to any coordinates or to anyone with a tracking signal in case they need backup."

"I hope it works after all the time and effort you've put into it," Raf said. He shut the back of the medic's helm. "How's that feel?"

The medic rolled his shoulders and turned his helm to the sides a few times.

"A little uncomfortable," he grumbled, wincing slightly at the prickling sensation. "But, I'll fix it on the final model."

He straightened, facing the back wall behind the console.

"Alright," he said confidently. "First test."

The four humans looked on from the rail. Several awkward seconds passed before the three kids looked at Fowler doubtfully. He shrugged. It wasn't that he didn't share their doubt, but the old bot had surprised him time after time. Hell, building a groundbridge out of a bunch of mothballed Commodore computers was nothing short of miraculous.

"Hmm." Ratchet's optics focused past his HUD and on the wall again. "Maybe, if I reroute the command directly through my memory core …"

Pain seared through his processor, and it felt like his helm lit up like a lantern. But, then there was a bright flare of light and a deafening bang like a stun grenade and the bridge swirled to life into the wall.

"Ratchet?" Raf looked worried.

He groaned, cautiously cracking an optic to look at the groundbridge.

"Oh … frag …" he swore. "I'm alright."

"You don't look alright," Jack stated.

He steadied himself against his workbench, opening up his self-diagnostic menu on his gauntlet. There wasn't any physical damage at least, and everything seemed to be functioning normally.

"What happened?"

He met Raf's concerned look.

"It's … fine. Some data went the wrong way on a one-way connection, I think." He shook his helm to clear his vision, but it didn't really help. "I'll have to fix that."

"So, does the groundbridge work?" Miko asked.

"Why wouldn't it? I didn't reprogram anything on the bridge itself."

To prove his point, he strode through it to the site of the old base, but his helm felt like it might explode. Quickly, he went back through.

"Take it out!" he snapped, frustrated at himself. "It's back to the drawing board."

Raf nodded eagerly, but before the medic could sit back down for him, a chime indicated an incoming commlink.

"Ratchet." Optimus' voice sounded pressured, and they could hear the sound of phaser fire. "Requesting an immediate groundbridge to my coordinates."

"Doc, we're gonna need a bridge!" Wheeljack interrupted urgently. "We've got 'Cons on our tail, and we're running out of road down here."

"I'm sending one to Optimus first," the medic announced over both frequencies, quickly turning to the console. "Send me your coordinates in twenty seconds, Wheeljack."

His original bridge winked out and was replaced with another. Optimus, Bumblebee, and Smokescreen drove through at full speed, just barely able to stop before hitting the observation deck. All three took a moment to collect themselves and let their coolant run before transforming.

"Maybe you should work on building a second groundbridge instead of a fancy remote control," Miko suggested.

He shut down the bridge again and typed in Wheeljack's coordinates next. Ultra Magnus, Bulkhead, and finally Wheeljack tore through in an even bigger rush than the first team.

"Shut it down!" he ordered, transforming up into his bipedal form. "I left a little going-away present for the 'Cons," he said with a smirk.

Ratchet looked up from his monitor and felt his engine seize for an instant. "No WAIT!" he shouted, but it was too late. His sensors indicated an explosion of energy was coming through, and he forced it to shut down before it erupted into the hangar.

For a full second, everyone was silent. Then, the only other person paying attention besides Ratchet spoke up.

"Where's Arcee?" Jack asked uneasily.

The wrecker's brow rose, and he looked back at the wall, then to Optimus' team, then to his.

"WHERE'S ARCEE?!" the boy demanded.

"She was with you," Wheeljack said, looking to Optimus.

"She was coming to meet you after you called for backup!" Smokescreen said, defending Optimus.

Ultra Magnus stepped in. "Arcee did not report this to me. She must have went against protocol."

"You think?!" Wheeljack snapped. "I'll tell you what you can do with your protocol …"

"ENOUGH!" Ratchet snarled, making everyone jump. With their full attention, he brought up her life signal on the monitor. "She's online."

"Open a bridge," Wheeljack demanded. "I'm going back for her."

"You will do no such thing. That explosion has collapsed the cavern by now. You'll be phased into solid rock," Magnus protested.

"He just said she was alive!"

"I can go get the phase shifter," Smokescreen said, bolting for the storage vault.

"No time," Ratchet said. Her signal was weakening, and without her conscious, the groundbridge couldn't get a lock on her coordinates below ground. "I'll get her."

Without hesitating, he brought up the scout's signal on his GPS and routed it through his memory core like before. The pain was searing and instantaneous, same as the first time, but he ignored it and the groundbridge opened with a flash and a loud bang. He braced himself for more pain when he rushed through, but it didn't help. It nearly brought him to his knees.

But, he was in the cavern now, in a dark pocket of air. All around him, Ratchet could hear the rock cooling from the explosion and pebbles raining down on his armor as it settled. There wasn't much time. Where was she? The remote was supposed to make a bridge at her exact location. He turned on his headlights and swept them through the dust.

Several troopers lay crushed or in pieces, their armor charred black or still glowing a dull red from the heat. It made his tanks churn with dread.

"Arcee?" he called. There wasn't much of an echo. His voice sounded muffled even.

A huge part of the ceiling collapsed behind him, cutting him off from the groundbridge and nearly burring him alive.

"Primus," he hissed.

It didn't matter. He could summon one and go back the same way he'd come. No need to start getting claustrophobic. Arcee needed him.

He heard a soft moan, and swept the darkness with his lights again. A pile of rocks shifted, and he fell to his knees, throwing the stones and boulders aside frantically.

The rock above him cracked and groaned a warning.

He uncovered a scratched and dented gauntlet with the hint of a pink highlight beneath the char.

"Arcee!" He got his servos around her and pulled her free of the rubble.

The femme groaned, trying to sit up and get her bearings, but he stopped her from moving.

"Stay still," he ordered gently, kneeling beside her.

The heat had blackened her armor, and he could smell burnt coolant and lubricant from ruptured lines. The concussion in the confined space might have disabled her gyroscope as well.

"I'm here."

Arcee groped for him, trying to focus her optics to no avail.

"Ratchet …"

He took her servo, and she jumped, making his spark ache. "It's going to be alright," he promised.

The cracking sound intensified above him. The air pocket was collapsing.

He carefully scooped her still-smoking body up, and used his remote to summon a new bridge back to base. Like before, it didn't open up right where he'd needed it. Already the idea had proven a worth-while investment of his time and discomfort a thousand times over. Maybe he could recalibrate it.

"Stay alert, Arcee." But, he didn't need to say it. The femme knew the drill by now.

"I'm fine." She managed a smile, knowing she was lying through her dente, and knowing he knew that.

He relaxed a little. She'd be alright.

The pain swept through his sensors again, even more painful than before. His processor throbbed as he stepped through the groundbridge and back into the Autobot base.

"Arcee?! Is she okay?" Jack shouted, practically leaping down the stairs.

The rest of the team looked shaken.

"She'll be fine," he insisted quickly, carrying her past the rest of the 'Bots to his med bay.

"Maybe I didn't hear her comm me," Magnus mused, already beating himself up.

Optimus' face hardened, but he looked away from his SIC to meet Ratchet's optic. Bulkhead and Wheeljack shared an uneasy glance.

"I should've …" Wheeljack tried to begin. "If I hadn't …"

Bumblebee chirped and whirred and Smokescreen's doorwings rose hopefully with the black and yellow scout's.

"Yeah. The Doc's fixed lots worse. She's gonna be good as new in a few days, right?"

Ratchet had laid her down on the medical berth and didn't answer, already immersed in his work and the world where just himself and his patient existed.

"Can you feel this?" he asked, dragging his fingers up a blackened plate on her arm. "Arcee?"

Her optics were offline, and the joints in her arm felt limp.

"Arcee."

He patted the side of her helm.

"She was just awake," he said to himself. "Arcee!"

Her optics weren't even shuttered – just dark.

The base held their collective ventilations as he did a full scan of the femme with genuine panic in his optics. The results his diagnostic panel gave him weren't the answer he wanted.

"Is she …" Smokescreen began to ask, but Bumblebee hit him upside the back of his helm hard and gave an angry hiss of static.

"Ratchet …" Optimus spoke up, but the medic didn't look away from hastily opening her plating.

Finally, unable to take the tension any longer, Wheeljack shouldered his way past the rest of the team and watched as Ratchet looked around his suddenly new and vastly unfamiliar medical bay. He grabbed the crash cart and wheeled it into the medic's reach, and instinct took over again in a flash.

"Tell me what to do," he ordered. Ratchet glanced up, meeting his optics with impatience for an instant, and he fought back the impulse to grab the closest blunt, heavy object and hammer one of his Pit-damned grenades under Wheeljack's pelvic plating.

"Replace the main energon line in her shoulder assembly," he finally managed to say levelly as he set the charge on his spark defibrillator.

"Right."

The femme's body jumped with the shock of the paddles. Her spark glowed faintly. The timer had started.

His servos went to work, retiming her engine as his assistant worked on her ruptured line. The engine would have to be restarted before her spark went out again. The spark regulated the engine. The engine powered the spark. But, getting it all synced together wouldn't do her any good if she bled out the rest of her energon through the main line.

"I can fix an engine," Wheeljack insisted, moving Ratchet's servos aside. "You do the medic thing." He gestured back to her spark chamber.

Ratchet didn't argue. He grabbed up a cylinder of nitromethane from the cart. The wrecker's brow rose when he filled a syringe with enough to shock-start three mechs his size. Ratchet met his optics for an instant then pressed it into the fuel line between her engine and spark chamber, holding his ventilations.

Power systems got exponentially resistant to the treatment every time it was used. And, the more that was injected into her fuel, the greater the risk it would blow her engine. Even if he hadn't been forced to use the terrible grade of the Earth-made equivalent, Arcee had been revived more times than she could remember before she'd even met a medic that knew his aft from the business end of a phaser rifle.

"Got it," Wheeljack announced.

Ratchet dialed up the charge on the defibrillator, and placed one servo on the syringe and one on the paddles' console.

"Four steps," Ratchet stated. "Together on the first."

He could feel Jack's eyes on him and could sense him willing his friend and partner back as hard as the current building up in the paddles.

"One."

Wheeljack torqued a timing gear, pulling energon into her engine at the same time as Ratchet releasing the first charge into her spark. Naturally, her engine spluttered to life with the jolt for a few cycles.

"Two."

He injected half of the nitromethane, Arcee's chassis went rigid and her engine whined to dangerous RPMs, but her spark began to dim once more.

"Three."

Ratchet shocked her spark again, and shot the rest of the stimulant into her.

"Four."

As her spark brightened again and her engine sped up even more, the two synced up again. The glow of her spark corresponding with the speed of her engine, each driving the other.

For a moment, he felt relief. But, then a monitor began flashing a warning, and her spark began to dim again. Her engine began to slow.

No. That should have worked. Engine and spark should have continued their cycle on their own.

"Doc, what do we do?"

Her optics remained offline, and her body lax. Ratchet scanned her. Maybe the damage was too much for her to come back online. Maybe her programing was corrupted. There wasn't time to check.

He grabbed cables to a backup power supply and clamped them to her backup conduit. Her engine hiccuped a sputter then evened out. But, her spark was still going out. It wouldn't accept a direct power source. After an instant of panic, he turned and tore his test engine off his workbench. He swept a place clear on the table beside her and hooked the surrogate engine up to her spark chamber.

For what felt like an eternity, he watched her spark and engine struggle to accept their alternatives.

"Is she alright?" Jack finally asked.

Then, by an act of Primus, everything worked.

"Ratchet?"

"She's stable," he chose to announce, letting Jack assume that was good news. "I … have my work cut out for me."

He looked around him at the other members of his team, then returned his full attention to the femme on his table. Even Optimus couldn't read the unease in his medical officer's faceplate.

"See, I knew Ratchet had it under control," Smokescreen assured Bumblebee.

"We will leave you to your work then, Old Friend," Optimus stated – an order for everyone to clear out.

Only Wheeljack paused to look at him. He almost wished that the wrecker was as blissfully ignorant as the others.

"You should take Jack home," Ratchet suggested.

"Smokescreen's gonna do it," he dismissed.

"Smokescreen didn't blow up his friend and partner." Wheeljack scowled, a snide and defensive comment on the tip of his glossa. "Do it! It's too late in the game to have bad energon between allies."

They glared at each other in a standoff for tense moment before Wheeljack finally vented a collective sigh, ground his dente, and turned his back on the medic without a word.

When the base was empty, Ratchet felt his knees weaken and a wave of nausea wash over him. He looked back at the charred femme's chassis and the makeshift life support she was tangled up in.

There was only one thing that could be wrong. Only one thing regulated the sync between the spark and engine, but he didn't want to confirm it. She'd been fine, then she wasn't. How was that possible? He'd never seen someone's CPU fail instantly while they were alert and aware – at least not without an outside factor.

The medic stepped back to the medical berth and pressed his fingers to the nodes beneath her jaw, accessing her operating system.

Nothing.

He shuttered his optics in a grimace of pain.

"Arcee …"

* * *

He worked. It was all he could do. No one came into his medical bay for fear of the mech 'ripping them a new one' as Miko put it. No one saw. No one knew.

He was only dimly aware of the passage of time. It all blurred together in a haze, and he realized at some point that he'd subconsciously put himself into full battle mode. It had been vorns since the last time – on a battlefield of dead and dying soldiers, unable to recharge, unable to refuel. He and his underlings could go ten decacycles on a full tank with only their processors and the rudimentary functions to perform their tasks.

But, he hadn't refueled recently. How long had he been holed up? Weeks? A month? Longer? It didn't matter if he could fix her.

All he'd had to do was _fix_ her.

The femme was clean now. Her armor mended. Burnt lines replaced. New wires routed. She looked like she was recharging – like she could wake up any minute.

But … something was still not right. Why wouldn't she online her optics as suddenly and as without reason as when they'd gone out.

He opened her chest again and studied the pale amethyst light in the bottom of her chamber. It pulsed weakly by steady. His legs felt stiff and tired, so he sat as he retraced lines for the thousandth time. But, nothing was out of place.

He picked up her fingers and studied them draped over his single digit and slumped. She'd been so strong, but he'd failed. Now, she was this weak, frail, shell. Just a prison for the once-vibrant spark inside.

He keened, low in his chest and squeezed her servo, letting his grief go and bringing systems back online so he could allow himself the luxury of mourning through his energy field.

"I'm sorry."

She'd been kept long enough. There was no Allspark to call her back home, but somewhere out in the frontier of space, a femme on a ship or in an outlying colony was ready to offer a new chance to the beautiful spark that would be reborn her daughter.

The medic turned off the engine, and watched for a few moments as her spark's pulse became erratic and began to flutter then dim. He cut the power to her own engine and listened to it whine down with her spark. He engulfed her in his field, so her spark could feel that it would be missed even if her consciousness had been gone long before now.

It dimmed to darkness, gave a final glow of defiance, then went out. He felt her fade from the awareness of his field, going up and away. Then, he was alone with a table of lovely spare parts.

"RATCHET!"

Something sent a jolt right up his back struts, startling him into summoning his bayonets as he spun to face his attacker. And, a terrified-looking blue femme threw herself into his arms.

"Ar … Arcee?" He blinked, trying to reset his optics.

She sobbed into his chest, and all he could think to do was cautiously wrap his servos around her. Understandably skeptical, he turned his helm and looked behind him at the table and felt a staticy surge race through his circuits to see the empty chassis still there and sparkless.

But, the femme in his arms felt real as he gently pushed her away to see if it was her.

"I'm not dead! You IDIOT!" she screamed and punched him square in the jaw.

He jumped back, and fell off his stool onto the floor with a crash. Reorienting himself, he bolted up and looked around him at his lab. She was gone, but his spark was still racing. He got up and looked at the femme on his table. Her spark was still pulsing, her engine was still humming. Both of the backups were still running.

Just a dream. Oh, Primus – he must have blacked out.

Well, he was awake now, but not for much longer he realized, checking his stats out of habit. He was on the cusp of emergency stasis.

Stumbling, he grabbed a cube of energon out of a cabinet and refueled, fighting back the dizziness of lack of recharge.

It had felt so real. He still felt his spark aching with loss.

It could wait. He needed to recharge.

* * *

Arcee felt terrified and alone again. She shouldn't have hit him, no, but the fragger had pulled her plug! Didn't he see her? Where was everyone?

She didn't want to be here! The lights began to fade back to their twilight gray again, and the med bay lost its clarity. She'd thought for sure, she'd gone to the Pit at first, but she felt Ratchet close by. Frag, she'd SEEN him just now.

Arcee had tried looking for anyone else, but leaving base had been even more frightening. It seemed like the further she got from the med bay, the blurrier her environment became. Out of desperation, she'd gone all the way to Jasper once, only to find a grid of streets and vague, boxy landmarks. Beyond that, it went white, and she'd lost her nerve and come back before she got too far to find her way back.


	5. The Lost Chapter

Working Title: What Little Femmes are Made Of, Chapter 6.0

Rating: M

Pairing: Arcee/Tailgate, Arcee/Cliffjumper

Notes: I found some pieces that got cut from Little Femmes when I was cleaning out my closet. (I procrastinate a LOT at work and handwriting stories makes me look convincingly busy.) One's a pretty decent chunk of chapter 6 where Arcee is fighting inside her processor to come back online. I felt like it got too far off the main story and Wheeljack, so I chopped it and replaced it with the bit where Cliffjumper and Tailgate's ghosts just kiss her to shock her back. Also worth mentioning is that I hadn't read the IDW comics before I wrote this. I get the impression Tailgate is NOTHING like I've portrayed him in this.

Does anyone else have drifts of loose paper that threaten to cascade down on them when they try to get anything out of their closet or falls out of your car when you pull out the groceries? No? :\

* * *

Distant thunder roused her in the darkness. She couldn't tell if her optics were off or if she was only seeing black. The air tasted metallic and smelled like old smoke and phaser burns. The only other things she could hear were her own ventilations and wind.

Arcee rolled onto her side. Her body felt numb and strangely tingly with static. Everything also felt like it was made of lead including whatever was stuffing her helm. If her optics weren't off, she wanted them to be. When was the last time she'd recharged? She tried to bring up her vitals on her HUD, but it only showed error messages.

She got her knees under her and stood on unsteady legs for a moment before reaching out to get her bearings. Her fingers found a metal wall. Was it a prison cell? Or just a dark room? What happened to her? She strained her processor to remember, but couldn't recall … anything. She knew her name was Arcee, and her instinct told her not to panic until she'd fully assessed her situation.

So, her fingers made their way around the perimeter of her room. It was a small space, and there was a door on the wall that she'd started at. The button to open it was nonoperational. Somehow that didn't surprise her. The femme forced it open easy enough and moonlight from a broken exterior wall spilled in. She was home, Arcee realized as she looked out at the glimpse of the Sea of Rust through the cracks and holes. Not just Cybertron, but her real home. She remembered as she turned around to look back into the room. This had been her room. It always had been – from the first night her mother had pulled her tender protoform into the warm lull of her engine to the last restless night she'd spent there before going to the academy.

Across the narrow corridor was what had been her father's room. Its door was broken, and inside the wind had collected dust in the corners over the decades since it had been occupied. Arcee used to come in here when the storms off of the sea were loud and terrifying to a youngling. Bulwark, despite his usually stern disposition, always let her stay. He'd scold her for being afraid, but he never stopped Arcee from climbing onto his berth and sleeping through the rest of the storm 'safe' between his back and the wall. When morning came, she'd wake to find herself back in her own room.

Another door housed a washroom. The faint smell of old oil made her think of every battle Bulwark had had to endure to keep his sparkling clean. No one else who knew the imposing mech would have been able to imagine the commander wrangling his daughter into sitting still in the basin so he could spray the grime and dirt out of her joints. Arcee smiled at the memories. How had she forgotten anything so dear to her?

Beyond the small common room, the front of their living quarters had been destroyed, and she climbed down to the transit way below. What was she doing here? She still couldn't remember that.

To the south, a powerful electrical storm was brewing and approaching fast. She thought about taking shelter in her old room, but something tickled at her awareness more than the charge in the air. It tugged at her spark almost painfully and made her engine want to run faster. Arcee still felt exhausted, but staying here wasn't an option. She _had_ to get somewhere out there. Someone needed her. They were crying out for her, and it was going to tear her apart if she didn't get to whoever it was – before it was too late.

Her father's base was in shambles. The landing docks had been destroyed, and giant rusting hulks lay forgotten on their sides. The runway was strewn with twisted metal and debris, but her two-wheeled form was nimble enough to avoid most of it. The war … She remembered how her form had been a valuable asset when she'd been fighting. She'd been a fighter. She _was_ a fighter and a damn good one. Her father had raised her to be a soldier. She followed orders. She shot to kill. Size and strength came second to skill and intelligence.

The later part of her youth had been spent defending the base's large infirmary. It had been the closest one to Kaon for the Autobots, and both sides had fought bitterly for control of it. The base was her home. She took comfort in the presence of the battle-hardened mechs that had accepted the spunky two-wheeler running between their heavy peds. For the longest time, she'd gotten it in her processor she would become a medic like the bots she'd grown up around. Bulwark would have encouraged her and helped her no matter what she chose to do, but Arcee knew if she had become a medic, he'd have had a lot fewer rechargeless nights worrying about her. Too bad he'd shot himself in the ped early on by telling her his war stories every night before she powered down and taking her to the range. Hard as Arcee tried, she hadn't been able to shake the tingle in her energon when she held a rifle. Combat was in her programing. She could shoot a con's optic out from three and a half kliks away. She had held the lower power station for a nine day onslaught with four fighters and a prayer.

The Cybertronian motorcycle came to an open place, and she shifted back to her bipedal form to look around the familiar setting of her childhood. It had once been a public commons for art and memorials. Younglings had played here, herself included, but all it was now was a testament to the war that destroyed everything indiscriminately and those sparks it had returned to the Well.

"Arcee!" A message blinked up on her HUD. It was a closed message system. He'd made it for them, so they could communicate silently and privately. "Take cover! Before he sees you …"

"Who?" she messaged back, ducking behind a pillar and summoning her blasters.

"Cliffjumper. He's gone rogue, and he's out of his fragging processor!"

Cliffjumper? The red mech manifested in her memory like a ghost.

"Where are you?"

"Southwest corner. I'll meet you in the access alley."

Something still pulled her to continue north, but a promise of familiarity prodded at her – like it was something she'd missed.

She cautiously crept through the shadows the buildings cast in the moonlight then into the narrow alley. Arcee ducked into an alcove and someone grabbed her and pulled her into the dark.

"Tailgate?" she whispered.

"Hey there, Trouble," he whispered, sounding slightly pained. He smiled at her when she turned in his arms to look at him. It felt like it had been so long since she'd seen her partner.

"What happened to you?" She wiped up some of the glowing blue liquid leaking from the side of a dented chest plate and torn fuel lines in the joint of his arm.

"He got the jump on me, but … you should see Cliffjumper." He smiled.

Arcee doubted Cliff had walked away in half as bad of shape. Tailgate prided himself on his hand-to-hand prowess. He'd been the one to sharpen Arcee's melee combat skills even. But, the red mech was a veteran with almost a millennium on them. Despite his size, he had a reputation even among the Decepticons for being someone to avoid tangling with alone. But, he wouldn't have attacked his own without reason.

"What did you do to grind _his_ gears?" she asked, pulling out some crimps from her subspaced med pack.

"What? Nothing!" he snapped defensively. "I was trying to find you!"

Arcee pressed him to lean back where he sat, ignoring his amger. He relaxed as the femme began closing the broken lines. Tailgate vented a sigh, and she felt warm contentment in the mech's unguarded energy field. It was how he always felt when he was alone with her. She remembered … feeling the same. Every time their roles had been reversed – from the first time their captain had ordered his best soldier to go get Commander Bulwark's brat out of trouble … and the second time … and the third time when he'd volunteered. He was supposed to _keep_ her out of trouble after that, but the energetic and enthusiastic femme had already gotten under his plating like a scraplet by then. He'd claimed anyone else that didn't know how she operated would get themselves offlined if he gave up his burden.

"Glad you found me," he said softly. "Think I'm gonna live?"

She smirked meeting his optics. "Don't be so dramatic. I'll have you patched up in no time."

"We can't stick around out here for very long," he reminded her. "That's a Pit of a storm brewing,"

Arcee gave him room to stand up, but she returned to the entrance to the alley and looked back at the storm, then north again.

"I've got to keep moving."

"What? You're not going to leave me, are you?" he chuckled in disbelief. But, the look on her face made him sober. "That electrical storm is going to tear up anything with a spark when it comes through. Let's wait it out, then I'll go with you. … Arcee?"

She shook her head, and her optics were drawn to a transit way in the distance. It was that way. She was sure.

Tailgate's hand clasped her shoulder, and she had to look at him again. She didn't want to leave him. It hurt to think about it for some reason. He'd been her partner through thick and thin for the better part of a century. She was the patience for his thermonuclear temper and the smile for his cold demeanor. Tailgate the governor for her energy and the brawn for her sometimes overambitious tactics.

"Come on," he coaxed gently. "Have you ever regretted riding out a storm with me?"

Had she? A memory tried to come forward from her processor, but it struggled to break free. It was so overwhelming, she thought it felt like reality was wobbling around her. Arcee shook her helm trying to clear it. There were always electrical storms on the Sea of Rust, but Delta Team had focused mainly in and around Kaon. Why did that seem so significant?

"Arcee," Tailgate said softly, making her meet his pale optics. He smirked and took one of her hands in his, bringing it to his face plates. Her spark ached to remember, and Tailgate … seemed aware of the emotional tempest he was causing. "Remember?" he whispered, kissing her palm.

Oh, Primus. She squeezed her optics shut against the tears. How could she forget something like that? It made the air feel like it tightened around her as it all came rushing back.

"_How is there an electrical storm this bad so far inland?" she asked no one in particular._

"_Nothing I've ever seen," her partner admitted with a shrug._

"_At least, if we're stuck taking cover, the Cons are stuck too," she pointed out, but it didn't seem to console him._

_They listened to the howling wind outside for a long time. It had caught everyone off guard. She and Tailgate had been on their way back to Delta Team's base and had been cut off by Decepticon infantry. With nowhere else to go, they'd gone into a dilapidated highrise and found an interior room to wait it out. It was dark, cramped, and smelled like dust, but it sure beat getting their circuits fried in the unending lightening beating the city outside._

"_How long do these last?" he asked._

_Arcee looked up from their single energon lamp. On its lowest setting it could glow for days, giving them just enough light for their optics to adjust. Hopefully they wouldn't need it that long._

"_Could be a few hours. Could be a few days," she said. "It was hard to tell without seeing it come in from the open sea ahead of time. Either way, it's safe to assume we've got some time to burn. Think of it like a vacation – only miserable, dark, and stuffy."_

"_And boring," he growled. "I'd rather be offing Cons."_

"_Just relax," she said with a smirk. "Power down as long as you like. Write a letter home. Think about something besides reports and cleaning your guns."_

"_Still feels like we're wasting time," he said, producing a datapad just to spite her._

_She rolled her optics. What was he going to report? '2200 cycles: Still storming. No Decepticon activity. Pvt. Arcee has ceased attempts at communication in favor of glaring.'_

"_Well, I'm going to catch up on some recharging."_

_He gave a noncommittal grunt. She slipped to her back then curled up facing the wall, using her arm for an uncomfortable headrest. There was just the sound of the raging storm and Tailgate's fingers on the pad. She thought she'd slip right into a good recharge since it sounded so much like her room at home, but rest eluded her. Eventually, Tailgate's tapping stopped, and the room was silent. She wasn't used to silence after decades of powering down with the sounds of phaser fire and artillery around her or even the constant buzz of activity there was at the base._

_She let down her energy field and prodded at Tailgate's like a clingy sparkling. He could've resisted, but he knew it would be futile. Their partnership was so close and had lasted for so long that Arcee joked their sparks had bonded by default. If they got three more like them, maybe they could combine like the transformers in the stories her father used to tell her. Tailgate would make a great aft. He sighed with agitation but let his go instead of subjecting himself to her tireless assault. His energy field was tired and bored but content._

_She probably felt similar to him. Maybe even more than content. Admitting her silly, youthful crush on Tailgate embarrassed her just admitting it to herself, but she liked him – a lot. Arcee didn't know when the exact moment was that she had decided she'd return this mech's attentions if he ever showed her any, but it had definitely been sometime between when he'd told their captain he refused to coddle a good fighter like a sparkling just because she was Bulwark's and Tailgate starting a knock-down-drag-out fight with Hitch when he suggested Tailgate quit hogging all of the team's resident pleasure bot. Hitch was a prick that always made bad jokes like that, but the fuse to Tailgate's temper was short when it came to his partner._

_Arcee sat up again and situated herself against the wall with him, snuggling into the warmth of his plating. Tailgate's optics were shuttered and his arms crossed over his chest, pretending – terribly – to be resting in a partial shutdown. He knew what she was thinking, and it wasn't his favorite thing to talk about._

"_Will you go home?" she asked, breaking the silence._

"_Hmm? When?"_

"_When the war's over, Blockhead."_

_He vented a sigh. "This war isn't the kind that just ends," he stated. "I don't think it'll be over in my lifetime."_

"_I'm sure everyone feels that way," she shrugged. Arcee was aware of his sunny outlook already. She even agreed with him, albeit reluctantly. "But, the last war ended eventually. Hypothetically: Megatron lays down his weapons tomorrow. Will you go home?"_

_His energy field felt caged. She was up to something. "No," he finally admitted carefully. "I wasn't femme-borne like you. I don't have a home in the same sense. I'll probably just join the interplanetary force – see new places, fight some different kinds of bad guys."_

_Arcee nodded. "Sounds fun."_

_Silence stretched out as she waited for him to take the bait. At last, she took a gamble and pulled in her field like she intended to power down against him._

"_Will you go back?" he surrendered. "Like he wanted?"_

"_No. It won't be the same without Commander Bulwark or knowing the Cons have been there," she admitted. "I'd rather stick with you."_

"_You'll be better off here. Go on and be a medic like you always talk about – Primus knows good ones are getting hard to come by," he said. "Or, join the Guard for a few centuries. I think they'd snap up a fighter like you pretty quick."_

_Arcee smiled. "Yeah? Maybe I could wear a little paint again and perk up my wings? Catch some gold-plated war machine's optic and live out the rest of my days on a cushioned plinth, mothering primes?"_

_He had no response to her sarcasm, but he felt amused. Sometimes she could read him like a datapad._

_Arcee touched his scratched and dented bracer. He stiffened at her touch and jerked his field away from hers. She pushed her luck and traced it to his hand. He couldn't run from it this time. Not unless he wanted to go out in the storm._

"_I'd rather be with you, Tailgate." She expected him to resist her, but the mech let her guide his hand to her face so she could kiss the broad palm. "Even if it's laying in a ditch, fighting for our sparks."_

_Nothing._

_He took his arm back and refused to meet her optics. Arcee snapped her field back before he could have the satisfaction of making her lose her temper for a change. Then, she lay back against the wall again. After a tense pause with only the sound of the storm to fill the silence, she heard him pull out his datapad again and begin typing. '2220 cycles: Still storming. No Decepticon activity. Pvt. Arcee is showing signs of battle fatigue. Waiting for her to power down to disable weapons.'_

_She didn't realize she had powered down until the storm jolted her online from nightmares she couldn't remember. Where was she? The light was off. The building groaned against the strain of the wind, and it sounded like the lightening was right outside. She sat up in the dark and looked around. Tailgate's optics opened._

"_Think we should move?"_

"_The worst will pass in a few hours," she said, shaking her helm even though he couldn't see it. "We're fine."_

_She moved to lay back down, but before she could power down again, she felt the mech settle down beside her with Arcee between his back and the wall – like he knew comforted her when she was too stressed to rest. She relaxed and rolled over to face the plating of his back. Arcee wanted to touch him. She'd tortured him enough though, so the femme settled for getting as close as she could and shuttered her optics. The mech stayed quiet, and she felt guilty._

"_Tailgate?"_

_No reply, but she knew he was still awake._

"_I'm sorry," she whispered. "That was out of line."_

_Silence. But, that was good enough._

_A moment later, the mech rolled over with the creak and groan of metal on metal, and he touched her face in the dark. Arcee met his nearly white optics._

"_You know, I used to not be able to power down unless I was alone," he whispered. "When you're raised with a bunch of other sparklings that all fight and squabble over everything, it just comes naturally."_

_She smirked. He rarely talked about his youth. It made it hard to believe most times that the mech had less than a decade on her._

"_But, now … If I don't feel you close by, I can't even turn off my optics."_

"_That's not a good thing if you're going to join the interplanetary force," she pointed out dryly._

"_Only if you don't come too."_

_Arcee felt her spark freeze for a moment._

"_Would you really go with me if I did?"_

"_Of course I'm going with you. Don't think you'll get rid of me that easy."_

_He chuckled._

"_I know better." She felt his hand at her hips, and he pulled her against his chassis. "But, I hope you know you're stuck with me too," he added, close to her face now._

_Boldly, Arcee felt for his mouth with her lips._

"_I've known that for a while," she chuckled softly before kissing him._

_Arousal crept forward in his energy field, for once, without the usual guilt or caution interfering. But, he withdrew just as her fans were kicking on. Tailgate found her hand and brought it to his faceplate._

"_I'd be content with just this," he offered, kissing its palm, "if you wanted to wait until the war ends. You never know. You might bump into that golden war machine in the meantime."_

_The sentiment nearly melted her spark, but she caught his mouth again._

"_I don't think it's ending tonight, so that's not going to be soon enough for me," she smiled against his kisses. "But, you're going to have to be a little patient with me this one time."_

"_Have I _ever_ lost my patience with you?" he scoffed, jokingly._

_She rolled her optics in the dark. "No, never," she mocked. But, she kissed him again, and the mech welcomed it. "I've not synced up before," she finally admitted._

_He startled her when he laughed with both excited surprise and genuine amusement._

"_Well, that makes us about even. I'm so terrible at it," he admitted. "I've never interfaced."_

"_Oh?" She grinned, pushing herself up so she could sit. "Maybe you've just never had the right femme?"_

"_Possibly," he said. She heard his fans come on when she traced the joint of his hip. "You're welcome to try all you want. I'll be more than patient with you if you don't give up on me."_

"_Fair enough." She smiled._

_It turned out, he was worse than terrible at syncing. Tailgate was awful. He got excited easy enough, but as soon as his system slowed beyond a certain point, he panicked and lost focus. He was a mech who'd known fighting before he'd known femmes. The only sensation he had to compare it to was losing too much energon. But, Arcee was more determined than any pleasure bot he'd ever wasted his credits on. Not to mention, Tailgate didn't want to disappoint her. All in all, it was as slow and gentle as she'd needed her first to be._

_He hadn't been able to truly believe a femme like Arcee could love a grunt like himself until he finally did let go for her and felt Arcee's genuine adoration and hunger for him through their hard-earned connection. Tailgate refused to let go. Even after he'd exhausted himself and they finally lay down to recharge, he didn't want her to cut him loose. His spark belonged to her now, and if Arcee had thought he made a jealous partner, Tailgate would've went head to head with a guardian if one gave her a second glance._

He slipped an arm around her and pulled her closer as the memory receded. An old and comfortable-feeling ripple of pleasure washed through her, and Arcee couldn't resist leaning into him to feel the heat of his chassis against hers. It felt like it had been so long. Tailgate's hands slid to her waist, tracing transformation seams down her back to one of his favorite hot spots.

"Tailgate …" She shivered as he ran his fingertips up a sensitive winglet and more than willingly shuttered her optics and caught his mouth when he turned her around and bent to kiss her.

"I missed you," he breathed when he let her go.

Arcee felt something like guilt as she gave in to her hunger. Why wouldn't she want to stay right here? There was a storm coming. Tailgate would take his time and make her feel like nothing else mattered.

She smiled, kissing the bridge of his helm and meeting his optics. "That storm looks like it'll only last a couple days. Think you can sync up fast enough to make it worth the effort?"

He chuckled at her friendly jab. "Right now, I don't think it'd take much."

She knew it wouldn't, and the arousal in his energy field was making her fans run fast.

"There's a place not far from here," he rumbled, inviting her to feel what she was doing to his engine. "Stocked up on energon and there's even a decent sized berth."

He slipped free of her and took her hand, tugging her toward the south. She wanted to go with him. Arcee glanced at the storm again then looked north. Tailgate's grip on her hand tightened.

"Arcee?"

She looked up into his optics again, but something in them and in her bond with him sent a chill of panic through her.

"Come on," he whispered urgently. "Please. Don't leave me again, Arcee!"

"But …" She frowned, as something tried to surface from her memories. "I didn't leave you, Tailgate," she said, pulling her hand free so she could take a step back. "You … you were offlined."

It rushed back into her processor so suddenly, she gave a startled yelp. She'd broken rank because he'd missed a sniper. She'd gotten separated. Arachnid. Torture. He'd come looking for her. He'd come to get her out of trouble like he always did.

"No …" she muttered, bracing herself. She remembered what came after that, and the pain tore into her spark like it was happening all over again. "Tailgate!"

It had felt like the spider had torn a living part of her out of Arcee when Tailgate's spark had gone dark. It had left a red hot trail of destruction through her circuitry. She barely remembered her rescue, the pain had been so crippling.

But, something held on to her. When she'd come out of stasis in the infirmary, it had felt like her partner was just out of sight. She'd thought it was all a bad dream at first. Every time she powered up … it felt like it had just been a bad dream. He was there with her. He wouldn't leave her. Everyone else did though. They'd thought she was a broken femme with a damaged processor. But, she didn't want their pity. She just wanted to be left alone. She withdrew into solitude. She couldn't work with anyone. Tailgate didn't want her to, and she didn't want to either. He'd keep her safe; he'd keep her out of trouble.

Why had she left him?

"Tailgate, I …" She made to step back into his arms, but something slammed into him, ripping his energy field away from her and leaving her weak in the knees. "No!"

She looked up to see another familiar face locked in a hold with Tailgate. Cliffjumper was too fast for him, and broke an arm free to strike Tailgate between the audio receptor and his optic. Tailgate stumbled to recover before the red mech slammed his helm into Tailgate's then drilled his other fist into Tailgate's neck, forcing him to the ground.

Arcee had summoned her blasters before she'd realized it, but she couldn't bring herself to shoot.

"Cliff …"

The mech turned to look at her with a foreign expression of serious, cold sobriety on his faceplate.

"Go!" he ordered, waving her away. "You have to beat the storm."

"But, why are you hurting him?"

"Arcee, get out of here!" he shouted, but Tailgate had gotten to his feet and tackled him while he was distracted.

He got a hook in under one of Cliffjumper's plates, sending a painful jolt through his chassis. He struggled to roll and face him. Tailgate was getting in every hit he could before Cliffjumper was able to overpower him. The neck, the line of his back, the joints of his shoulders, the back of his helm. But, Cliffjumper got his arms under him and threw their combined weight up. Tailgate tried to force him back down where he could get the other mech's arms only to be grabbed and thrown over Cliffjumper's shoulders and slammed back onto the ground hard enough that Arcee felt it. He got to his feet before Tailgate could recuperate and stepped toward Arcee.

She took a step toward Tailgate, but Cliffjumper moved between them. "No. Arcee … I know you want to give in, but you can't go back. Remember!"

It was like he was willing her to reach back, begging her to search. But, for what?

"But … I love him." She'd formed a bond with Tailgate over decades of trust.

Cliff's face fell sympathetically. "I know," he sighed. "But, you can't stay. Not this time."

"But, I want to!" she snapped at him. "I abandoned him! He needs me …"

"Arcee …" Behind him, Tailgate had gotten to his hands and knees again. He looked at her with relief in his optics.

Cliffjumper growled, clenching his fists at his side. And, she thought she saw Tailgate smile maliciously at the other mech.

"If that's really what you want," Cliff surrendered, shaking his head and stepping aside for her.

"That's what she said!" Tailgate snapped at him. "Leave her alone."

"If you really loved her, you'd be helping her," Cliffjumper accused bitterly.

But, Tailgate ignored him. He held out his hand for Arcee. She moved to take it, but shuddered as one last plea from the north pulled at her system. She couldn't resist looking again, and Cliff met her optics when she turned back.

"Stop," the red mech said, holding out a hand. She paused automatically. "Cee, I'm sorry."

Arcee frowned thoughtfully. "Sorry for wh …"

His fist came too fast for her to register even if she had been expecting it.

_Arcee hit the ground hard, her winglets bending back painfully under her weight as they furrowed through the hard pan of the Nevada desert._

"_Come on, Cee," the red mech jeered, a broad smile on his face. "You could've dodged that."_

_She jumped to her feet to face him again and wiped the energon out of the corners of her mouth._

"_It's only been a few decades since I saw you. How'd you get so rusty?"_

_Because when you worked alone, you didn't take on more than you could handle. All Arcee could handle in close combat were other scouts and infantry one-on-one. But, Cliffjumper knew that already. It was part of the reason they were here – again. She regretted coming to Earth with him more every day. And, she really hated his 'help,' but he was determined to give it. All the others at the base gave the unstable femme a wide berth. Why in the Pit couldn't he?_

"_Come on," he grinned, bouncing his weight from one foot to the other and beckoning her to come back. "You know you could wipe the smile off my face. Fight smart. Fight fast. I know Bulwark taught you that."_

_She knew she could too if he'd shut up and let her collect her wits. But, Arcee couldn't. That was the other part of the reason they were here. And, Cliffjumper wouldn't shut up until he got what he came for._

"_If you can get a hit in on me, I'll give you a surprise when we get back to your berth," he promised rakishly._

_Anger roiled through her system anew, and what little control she held on to slipped away. Arcee could swear she felt Tailgate's vents bristle open along her shoulders and back, she was so far gone._

_Cliffjumper caught her bull rush and redirected her momentum to throw her into the dirt again. This time, she rolled to her feet automatically and charged him again. She feigned a punch and fell back to throw him off balance, but he read her like a datapad and easily deflected a hook that would've debilitated him – if it had had the weight of a mech behind it. He countered easily, drilling her with a punch that _did_ have the intended weight behind it, and she crashed on her aft, her gyroscope struggling to determine up from down._

_Part of her was relieved that she was nearly exhausted, but the other part was fighting to hang on. Arcee had lost track of which half was angry at which and whose side she was on. Enough! She was fed up with it. All of it!_

_Cliff read her optics, his plating loosening in anticipation for her to run from him. But, her optics lied this time. Arcee did sprint with all of her speed away from the mech; he gave chase as quickly as his frame allowed. But, she rolled into her two-wheeled form long enough to build speed and hear his transformation and the roar of Cliff's engine behind her. She slammed on her front brake, and used the energy of the forward flip to throw herself up as she shifted back faster than any four-wheeler could. The red Challenger had only just registered her brake light through the dust when she brought her fist down on his hood with all of her momentum._

_He stumbled out of his alt mode in time to block a kick to his face. Arcee countered with a hook under his chin that snapped his head back. Cliff took a step back, and she tried to steady her nerves in what little time she had. The mech popped a joint back into place in his neck and looked down at her with a languid smile._

"_Someone's getting lucky tonight," he teased. "I'm gonna love making you squeal."_

_She growled, grinding her dente hard enough to hurt, but Arcee shook her helm to clear it before Tailgate's temper blinded her and got her tailpipe kicked all over again._

"_Think you've got it under control?" he asked innocently. "I'm ready to roll now, or I could run a little more out of you on the drive back."_

"_Would you just shut up?!" she snapped._

"_Don't be that way," he scolded. "You'll enjoy it. I promise. I mean … not that I won't either." Cliff shrugged with a chuckle. "I will. It's safe to bet Tailgate barely knew what to do with a femme, and I'd love to be the first mech to get under your plating the right way."_

_Ugh! He was such an insufferable slag hole – even when he wasn't trying. Cliffjumper was a Pit-spawned, circuit-smelting, virus when he put his processor to it. The icing on the oil cake was that he wanted her to know he was as aroused and excited as he was amused by their little scuffles. His unguarded energy field tickled her receptors with confidence and vigor to prove it. Primus, did he think a femme was supposed to be turned on by such a show?_

_Arcee wanted to believe she wasn't, and she let Tailgate take control again to convince herself._

_Cliff was ready for her open attack. He blocked her punch, parried a wild kick, dodged, deflected. What pushed her beyond her limits was knowing he was holding back, and in her processor's chaotic state, she couldn't hope to take advantage of his arrogance._

"_Two isn't enough?" he chuckled. "I don't know if I can handle three in a row. I've got patrol in the morning."_

_She charged him again with shameful recklessness. Her energy was drained, and it was her last desperate blaze of glory. Cliff caught her fist and stunned her with a headbutt that made her optics flicker. She staggered, and he finished knocking her off her feet then pinned her hands and chassis under him. Arcee tried to thrash and squirm free._

"_Let me go!" she snarled._

"_Make me."_

_OH! She was going to, she swore to herself. But, the more she struggled, the more tired she became instead of angry. Arcee couldn't beat him – not like this. Cliff weighed three times what she did, and he'd been a veteran fighter when she'd still been playing Base and Chase on the commons with the other younglings. She tugged at her arms once more, but it was pointless. Frustrated and drained, she gave up and shuttered her optics and turned her face away from him_

_She still felt Cliffjumper's excitement, but she knew she had nothing to be afraid of. For all the mech's bluster, he'd never acted on it. That had never been his goal._

"_There she is," he whispered gently, and Arcee felt coolant sliding down her cheeks. He vented a soft sigh._

"_I can't keep doing this," she said._

"_You have to, Arcee."_

"_Why?!" she demanded. "Prime doesn't care – as long as I can fight."_

"_Prime hasn't seen the real you fight. He doesn't know what kind of soldier he'd be giving up. I do."_

_Arcee scoffed bitterly, still refusing to look at him. "You don't know anything about me."_

"_Don't I?" he chuckled. "I guess I shouldn't be surprised you don't remember me. I was one in a couple dozen mechs that had almost been blown to scrap when the Decepticons razed our base of operations in a surprise attack. We were being patched up at an infirmary when the Cons attacked. I powered up when I heard the alarms. I couldn't even shift to my cannons I was so banged up. We thought we were slag. But, then the doors opened and fighters filed in, and this little spitfire with a rifle half the size of her was shouting orders like she'd done this a thousand times. If every bot in that room who hadn't had their spike blown off didn't feel like a dirty old mech then, they did by the time the raid was over. We watched her fight 'cons like they were practice dummies, and she knew how to do more than just look pretty with that rifle."_

_The memory heightened the sensation in his field._

"_The femme knew what she was doing to us. She made her rounds between fighting, helping the medics watch our stats, maybe even improving a few when she'd sit on a berth and smile for its occupant and ask about his war stories and battle scars. I heard her name, but I didn't realize who she was until Commander Bulwark visited with her the day before I was released. Her plating was darker than his, but her confidence and the way she carried herself mirrored her father exactly. And he was proud of her. He had every right to be."_

_Arcee relaxed under him, remembering every time she'd done those things._

"_Team Prime needs that fighter, not a blockhead mech trying to fight in a femme's chassis. You need to get her back."_

_She nodded, and Cliff sat back on his heel tires, releasing her. Arcee sat up, but didn't storm off like she had every time before._

"_Cee?"_

_She looked at him._

"_You're beautiful."_

_Her faceplate heated. For once, it didn't feel like he was trying to antagonize Tailgate to the surface._

"_Thank you," she surrendered._

"_A beautiful femme needs to be reminded every once in a while." He shrugged. "Since I don't think any of those slackers at base will do it, it's just one more burden I must bear."_

"_I meant thank you for everything," she clarified. "No matter how long this takes or how hard it gets, I want you to know I'm grateful. Anyone else would've thought I was a lost cause and left me to short circuit on Cybertron."_

_Cliffjumper smiled. "You're a femme worth fighting for," he explained. "Tailgate would be doing the same thing if it meant getting you back."_

_Arcee smiled for the first time since they'd arrived on Earth, and it made Cliff's expression sober a little as his field relaxed. She rose to her knees so she faced Cliffjumper and let her tired and nervous energy field go. The mech looked at her, slightly stunned by this turn of events. But, he didn't resist when she framed his face in her hands and touched her lips to his._

"_Since I know he'll be raring to tear into you as soon as I power up tomorrow, maybe I should thank you a little in advance," she whispered with a smile._

_He sighed with an audible whimper, and Arcee felt his hands wrap around her slender waist. A thick thumb found a sensitive spot just at the edge of the plating at her hips. She shivered and felt her fans come on from the sudden wave of heat in her core._

_Cliff pulled her closer, and Arcee broke away. He looked up at her wide, bright optics and grinned feeling her amusement. She kissed the bridge of his helm tenderly, and he took it as an invitation to nip at her neck and vent a hot breath under the plating. She gasped when he found another node of pleasure along her spine. She thought she had to be synced up for him to know where they were. Her system was certainly insisting she should._

_He flinched when she accidentally snapped him with a tiny white arch of electricity._

"_Sorry," she whispered, embarrassed. Arcee thought she had better self-control than that._

"_Don't be. Please!" Cliff was grinning like an idiot. "I take it as a compliment."_

_Arcee smiled shyly and tried to hide her embarrassment in a hug, slipping her arms around his neck and savoring the heat in his plating and the sound and rumble of his engine._

"_I could thank you a LOT in advance, if you wanted," she offered, since he already had her excited now. "It's been a long time."_

_He vented a sigh and let go, pulling away from her._

"_What?" She looked at him confused._

"_Nothing," he shook his helm. "It's just … I think we should hold off," he suggested meekly. "Let you recharge a couple days. I mean, this is good!" he insisted in the face of her disappointment and retreating energy field. "Arcee, please …"_

_He clasped her arms as she tried to stand._

"_I want to. Believe me! I'll open my panel if you want proof. It's just … you'll make more progress if he's itching for a fight and pulling out all the stops since he'll know what happens if he loses."_

_He had a point, and Arcee nodded stiffly. She hated it and hated herself for the brief moment she'd let herself feel excited. Frag him if he thought he was getter under her plating with or without Tailgate in his way._

"_I don't like that look," he admitted, shaking his helm._

_She transformed out of his grip and pelted him with sand and gravel as she tore away._

"_Arcee! Hey!" he shouted after her._

_She heard him transform and saw him gaining on her in her mirrors. Arcee slammed on her brakes and spun to face him._

"_Leave me alone!" she demanded. "I mean it. I don't care if it's good for me or not this time!"_

_The Challenger demeaned her bold stand by transforming back and grabbing her between the spokes of a tire before she could react._

"_Let me go!"_

"_No. Just listen to me …"_

"_If I change back, I swear I'm going to …"_

"_Sync up with me."_

"_Get fragged," she warned dangerously._

"_Please. I'm sorry!" he coaxed._

"_Cliffjumper!" She didn't want to shear his fingers off, but Ratchet _could_ fix him._

"_Just sync up like you wanted, Arcee. I promise I won't bother you about interfacing ever again if you're still mad at me tomorrow."_

_She revved her engine against her brakes, nudging his fingers threateningly._

"_Please. One time?"_

_Arcee shifted back, but Cliff still held on to the back of her ped at an awkward angel._

"_Come on – just to show me what I ruined and won't get again?"_

_She shook him off and scowled. "I can't sync up when I'm angry!" she accused._

"_You're not trying to offline me," he offered with a smile. "That's all the opening a mech like me needs."_

_Before she could give him some snarky reply, Cliffjumper pulled her to him like a toy, and his energy field spread from him as regret and panic were still fading away. Hunger and arousal were lingering in the background as he rubbed his cheek against her helm. Relief overshadowed everything else except for what he'd been trying to hide before. He loved her. It made her relax in his arms and let her field go again._

_He kissed the back of her neck. "I want to feel you happy, Cee," he whispered against her audio receptor._

_Arcee turned around to face him and surprised him when she grabbed his horns and kissed him._

_Cliffjumper hadn't been bluffing about much. He synced up with her so easily, and Arcee was shown a whole new side of syncing she'd never known about since Tailgate had been nearly as inexperienced as her. Cliff tickled her intimacy circuits as easily as he did her pleasure nodes. He used their sync to find other hot spots even she didn't know she had. He fed off of her arousal and showed her how to feel his so vividly that it felt like she was exciting herself. He made her overload just as hard and long with only his fingers and glossa on her valve as Tailgate ever had with his spike._

_And, when she'd arched her back, gasping his name, his interface plate and refused to close. Lucky him, Arcee was a fast learner. She had enjoyed his arousal as she'd caressed his spike. Better still, the echo of Cliffjumper's near-crippling need to throw her off of him and powerdrill her sweet little valve or waste his transfluid on her tormenting glossa helped her overload herself again for the mech's viewing pleasure._

_Her wounded pride still insisted she cut him off and lock her interface panel, but it was hard to stay angry at anything when she was synced up to Cliffjumper – a little trick he would come to exploit too often._

_It didn't take anything to make his previous resolve buckle, and if Arcee had thought just syncing with him would be enough to hold her over, she admitted she was wrong. His excitement at her overloads had been new and wonderful to experience, but feeling him lose control and overload _with _her made Arcee feel like a new femme._

_She was glad they hadn't waited. It took Tailgate months to act up again. With Cliffjumper's code fresh in her matrix more often than not, it was so easy to control her old partner's ghost._

* * *

I can't remember exactly what I had planned to happen after this – it's been so long. But, Cliffjumper convinces Tailgate to help her too and at the end she was going to find out that what she'd been drawn to all along was her and Wheeljack's grown son caught in the electrical storm but she got struck by lightning just as she saves him and comes back online as Ratchet's shocking her spark. ANYWAY, as much as I loved it and as bad as it stung to scrap all of it, it got too far off the plot.


End file.
